Source: http://masscases.com/cases/app/1/1massappct441.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 10:09:49+00:00

Document:
COMMONWEALTH vs. JAMES D. KELLY (and two companion cases [Note 1]).
There was no error in an in-court identification of the defendant in a criminal case by a witness who might have seen a suggestive photograph of the defendant prior to trial where the defendant did not call the witness at the hearing of a motion to suppress the photograph or otherwise develop at such hearing whether the witness had in fact seen the photograph and, if so, its effect upon the witness [444-445]; and there was no abuse of discretion at the trial in denial of a voir dire with respect to the identification [445-446].
INDICTMENTS found and returned in the Superior Court on September 15, 1971. The cases were tried before Tisdale, J.
Arthur D. Serota for the defendant Kelly.
Jay M. Forgotson for the defendant Foulks.
John McDonough, Assistant District Attorney (William Teahan, Jr., Assistant District Attorney, with him) for the Commonwealth.
These cases arise out of a bank robbery of the Union Federal Savings and Loan Association at the Eastfield Mall in Springfield on July 9, 1971, at about two o'clock in the afternoon; about $2,700 was taken. From the testimony it appears that at that time two men entered the bank. One was armed with a long barreled shotgun or rifle and stood by the door. [Note 4] The other came behind the counter and ordered the tellers to put the money in a bag he was holding.
One of the tellers, Linda Welzyn, identified him as the defendant Kelly. One William Shays testified that at about 2:20 or 2:30 P.M. he saw two men drive into the parking lot at the Eastfield Mall in an automobile, which later turned out to have been stolen. They left the automobile and drove off in a waiting station wagon operated by a woman. [Note 5] He identified one of the men as Kelly. The Commonwealth also introduced a photograph of the defendant Kelly and the defendant Foulks sitting in an apartment, rented by Kelly and occupied by Kelly and Foulks, in front of a coffee table on which were a number of packages of currency.
Kelly attacks: (a) the introduction in evidence of and the failure to suppress the photograph, (b) the identification by Mrs. Welzyn, and (c) the introduction by the prosecuting attorney of "mug shots" of the defendant. The contentions are without merit.
(a) The photograph. The motion to suppress the photograph was based on testimony at a pre-trial hearing by Kelly and Foulks' sister that it was kept in a manila envelope in a dresser drawer and that two detectives came to the apartment in the morning of August 21, 1971, questioned Foulks' sister and "looked around in the dresser." She further testified that on August 25 at about 2:30 or 3:00 A.M. four armed policemen "barged in" and went through the drawers. At no time did they produce a search warrant. She left the apartment and returned on August 28 to take her possessions, including the manila envelope.
361 Mass. 507, 511 (1972). In this case it would be pointless since our examination of the testimony convinces us that the defendant has not sustained his ultimate burden of proving that the photograph was taken during these searches -- quite apart from the testimony at trial by the landlord that his son found the picture on cleaning up the apartment in September after it had been vacated. See Commonwealth v. Causey, 356 Mass. 125, 128-130 (1969).
That the photograph was an accurate representation was not questioned; defense witnesses testified that it was taken as a joke some time before the robbery. The credibility of this testimony was a matter for the jury. The prosecution could obviously not fix a time when the photograph was taken, whether before or after the robbery. However, the photograph showed strapped money on the coffee table and strapped money had been taken in the robbery. And further "there were strong accompanying circumstances of guilt of an independent character." Commonwealth v. Coyne, 228 Mass. 269, 272 (1917). The photograph was obviously not enough to prove criminal conduct. But a robbery having been proved, and evidence having been introduced identifying Kelly as one of the robbers, the jury could properly consider the photograph as having some tendency to point to Kelly's implication. "Evidence which would be colorless if it stood alone may get a new complexion from other facts which are proved, and in turn may corroborate the conclusion which would be drawn from the other facts." Commonwealth v. Mulrey, 170 Mass. 103, 110-111 (1898) (Holmes, J.). A bank robbery of strapped money is not such an everyday occurrence as to preclude the jury as a matter of law from finding some corroborative significance in such a photograph. See Commonwealth v. Jones, 360 Mass. 498, 501 fn.2 (1971).
Defense counsel made no attempt to inquire from Mrs. Cook beyond the testimony elicited by the prosecuting attorney set out in fn. 6. He did not call Mrs. Welzyn or in any way attempt to develop whether she had in fact noticed the photograph, and, if she had, how, if at all, it had affected her. The pre-trial hearing was concerned almost exclusively with the identification by Mrs. Cook who, as it turned out, did not identify the defendant at the trial in any event.
suppress. Rule 101B of the Superior Court (1954). We observe that in any event Mrs. Welzyn had identified the defendant from photographs shortly after the robbery and long before the pre-trial conference of which the defendant complains. She had also had ample opportunity to observe him at the robbery.
In Commonwealth v. Gerald, 356 Mass. 386, 388 (1969), the Supreme Judicial Court warned, "There is risk that any use in evidence of photographs of the double type ordinarily used in police identification files will suggest to the jury that the defendant may have a prior criminal record. . . . [U]se [of such photographs] in evidence was undesirable." See Barnes v. United States, 365 F. 2d 509 (D.C. Cir. 1966); Commonwealth v. Nassar, 351 Mass. 37, 42-43 (1966); Blue v. State, 250 Ind. 249 (1968). See also cases collected in the annotation in 30 A. L. R. 3d 908. The circumstances may be such that the introduction of both views is necessary, e.g., in connection with an identification by a witness (see Commonwealth v. Nassar, 354 Mass. 249, 261 ), but in this case the point that the defendant had at some time been without a moustache could have been made by the introduction of only one of the mug shots. However, defense counsel made no such suggestion, and his objection to both photographs does not appear to have been made on this basis. Commonwealth v. McLellan, 351 Mass. 335 (1966).
Defense counsel in this case elicited testimony that the mug shots depicted the defendant when he was much younger and long before the present events. However, no motion to strike the photographs was thereupon made, nor had there been any attempt to argue the remoteness of the mug shots when the court ruled on their admissibility.
Accordingly, we need not decide whether the admission of both photographs, if proved to have been taken at a time remote from the robbery, would have been error. In any event, they were minimally prejudicial, if at all, since defense counsel had himself previously elicited from Mrs. Welzyn testimony before the jury that she had made an identification from mug shots soon after the robbery.
was . . . with the intent that . . . [the participants] would avoid apprehension by the police." Commonwealth v. Holiday, 349 Mass. 126, 129 (1965). Perhaps it could be found that the probable consequences of Foulks' possession were to impede the prosecution -- though that is not clear. However, the intent required to sustain a conviction for the crime of accessory after the fact, like that for accessory before the fact, "ha[s] nothing whatever to do with the probability that the forbidden result would follow upon the accessory's conduct." United States v. Peoni, 100 F. 2d 401, 402 (2nd Cir. 1938), quoted in Commonwealth v. Stout, 356 Mass. 237, 241 (1969). See Commonwealth v. Boris, 317 Mass. 309, 315-317 (1944). The offense requires the "purpose to hinder the apprehension, prosecution, conviction, or punishment of another for crime." Model Penal Code, Section 242.3 (Proposed Official Draft). See also Commonwealth v. Spezzaro, 250 Mass. 454, 458 (1925); Commonwealth v. Wood, 302 Mass. 265, 271 (1939); Commonwealth v. Tilley, 327 Mass. 540, 545-546 (1951); Commonwealth v. Holiday, 349 Mass. 126, 128 (1965); State v. Nicholson, 221 S.C. 399 (1952); State v. Clifford, 263 Ore. 436 (1972); State v. Young, 7 Ohio App. 2d 194 (1966), LaFave and Scott, Criminal Law Section 66, pp. 522, 525 (1972).
the defendant's proved possession. The court pointed out that "[t]here is much more here than mere unexplained possession of the stolen money" and therefore refused to accept the argument that this lapse of time was as a matter of law too long to permit the jury to draw an inference of guilty knowledge. See also Commonwealth v. Ross, 339 Mass. 428, 431 (1959), in which the court said, "In cases where the evidence is circumstantial and recent possession is relied on, several inferences are possible. . . . If the inferences of theft and receiving are equally probable the issue is conjectural." In such a case a verdict would be directed unless, as in the Ross case, there was other testimony which, together with the possession, pointed to one conclusion rather than the other. Here, however, there were no additional circumstances coloring the possession sufficient to permit an inference of an intent to obstruct justice. Foulks' expressed desire, after Kelly's arrest, to get rid of the gun because it was "hot" would seem to be at least as likely to arise from a concern for himself as from an intent to help the already arrested Kelly. Commonwealth v. Fancy, 349 Mass. 196 (1965). Commonwealth v. Spina, post, 805 (1973).
Accordingly, the judgments against Foulks for being an accessory after the fact to Kelly and Ola Mae Smith, [Note 9] respectively, are reversed, the verdicts are set aside, and judgment is to be entered for Foulks on each indictment. The judgment against Kelly is affirmed.
[Note 1] Both companion cases are against Sidney Foulks.
[Note 2] She was tried together with Kelly and Foulks as a principal and also found guilty. No appeal on her behalf is before us.
[Note 3] The defendant Foulks originally filed a timely bill of exceptions and thereafter moved before a single justice of the Supreme Judicial Court to join in Kelly's appeal under G. L. c. 278, Sections 33A-33G, which had been entered in the Supreme Judicial Court. The defendant's motion was allowed, and we construe this as permission to argue his exceptions as though incorporated in assignments of error. All parties have treated the case on this footing.
[Note 4] He was not tried with the others; he was deceased at the time of trial.
[Note 5] Ola Mae Smith was convicted on evidence that she drove the station wagon.
Q. (by the prosecuting attorney). Now, do you know from your own knowledge whether or not anybody else saw this picture?
THE COURT. While you were at the conference.
Q. And who is Mrs. Welzyn?
A. The other teller at the Union Federal.
Q. Was she an eye witness in addition?
[Note 7] The Regulations For Court Stenographers issued by the Superior Court then read: "9. In each case the stenographer shall take . . . (d) All conferences at the bench, unless the presiding justice otherwise orders." Presently the Duties Of Reporters reads: "8. In each case the reporter shall take . . . (d) all conferences at the bench, if and when requested by the presiding justice."
[Note 8] Mrs. Weathersby, who had been called by the prosecuting attorney, denied on the stand that Foulks had said that the gun came from the robbery. Her testimony to the contents of the written statement was, at best, admissible for impeachment purposes. However, there was no attempt to limit it. Cf. Commonwealth v. LaFrance, 361 Mass. 53 (1972).
[Note 9] No connection was shown between Foulks and Ola Mae Smith.

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