Court Opinion

ID: 9722409
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 09:29:08.261512+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:34.976651
License: Public Domain

Nolan, J.
(dissenting, with whom Lynch, J., joins). The purported reason for the “automatic standing” rule is to relieve criminal defendants from the perceived dilemma they face when seeking to exclude evidence in this type of crime. In Simmons v. United States, 390 U.S. 377 (1968), the United States Supreme Court held that testimony given by a defendant in support of a motion to suppress cannot be admitted as evidence of his guilt at trial. The only remaining “dilemma” is that, if the defendant chooses to testify at trial in a manner inconsistent with his or her testimony at the suppression hearing, the prior inconsistent statements may possibly be introduced to challenge the witness’s credibility (this issue has not yet been decided).
Nothing in the Massachusetts Constitution purports to protect a criminal defendant from the consequences of his *247perjury. The court, however, interprets art. 14 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights to require a special rule designed to protect those that the court thinks are most likely to perjure themselves. The court holds that, in order to prevent perjury, the party most likely to commit perjury should be permitted to prevail without testifying at all. This is a strange result. Cf. Commonwealth v. Panetti, 406 Mass. 230, 235 (1989) (Nolan, J., dissenting). I enthusiastically dissent from this unwarranted and unsupported interpretation of our Declaration of Rights.