Opinion ID: 196495
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Underlying Convictions and Sentences.

Text: 5 These appeals have their genesis in events that occurred over a quarter-century ago. In 1969, following a bench trial, a Massachusetts court found the petitioner guilty of charges stemming from a brutal attack and robbery that occurred the previous year. A more complete account of the crimes, unnecessary here, is available in Commonwealth v. Hamm, 19 Mass.App. 72, 471 N.E.2d 416, 418-19 (1984) (Hamm I ). The trial court sentenced petitioner to two concurrent, parole-eligible terms of life imprisonment for his convictions on counts of armed robbery and assault with intent to rape, and to a series of consecutive sentences totalling sixty-eight to eighty years on the other counts of conviction (including mayhem and assault with intent to murder). These consecutive sentences were to be served from and after the life sentences. 1 The appeals court, in an unpublished rescript, reduced the from-and-after sentences to twenty-six to forty years but upheld the convictions and sentences in all other respects. 6