Summary
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the defendant’s convictions for murder in the first degree and related offenses arising from the torture and killing of a victim. The court held that the prosecutor’s closing-argument comments concerning defense counsel and the defendant’s psychiatric expert were permissible and did not create a substantial likelihood of a miscarriage of justice. The court also declined to grant relief under G. L. c. 278, § 33E, including entry of a not-guilty-by-reason-of-insanity verdict, reduction to manslaughter, or a new trial.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the prosecutor's closing argument improperly criticized defense counsel's presentation of the evidence.
- Whether the prosecutor improperly disparaged or improperly vouched for or attacked the credibility of the opposing expert witnesses during closing argument.
- Whether the court should exercise its authority under G. L. c. 278, § 33E to direct a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity, reduce the murder conviction to manslaughter, or order a new trial after the jury rejected the defendant's lack-of-criminal-responsibility defense.
Holdings
- The prosecutor's comments responding to defense counsel's characterization of the evidence and commenting on counsel's personal opinion to the jury were not improper.
- The prosecutor did not improperly disparage the defendant's expert witness or improperly vouch for the Commonwealth's expert witness.
- The court declined to direct a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity, reduce the murder conviction to manslaughter, or order a new trial under G. L. c. 278, § 33E.
Key quotations
“Within reason, prosecutors' may be critical of the tactics utilized by trial counsel in defending a case.” (674)
“The jury could accept the opinion of the Commonwealth’s expert and reject the opinion of the defendant’s expert; their verdict is consistent with the evidence that the defendant was criminally responsible when she killed the victim and that the killing was committed with deliberate premeditation and extreme atrocity or cruelty.” (676)
Factual background
The jury could have found that the defendant lured a nineteen-year-old victim to an abandoned trailer, where the defendant and two accomplices bound, tortured, assaulted, and killed the victim before setting the trailer on fire. The defendant subsequently took steps to conceal her involvement and later confessed after receiving Miranda warnings, giving a detailed account consistent with the physical and forensic evidence. At trial, the defense argued lack of criminal responsibility based on mental illness, substance abuse, and childhood abuse; defense and prosecution psychiatrists offered conflicting opinions concerning the defendant's criminal responsibility and ability to premeditate.
Procedural history
After a nine-day jury trial, the defendant was convicted of murder in the first degree on theories of deliberate premeditation and extreme atrocity or cruelty, kidnapping, arson of a dwelling, and five counts of assault and battery by means of a dangerous weapon. The trial judge later allowed the defendant's renewed motion for a required finding of not guilty on the arson indictment; the remaining judgments and sentences were appealed. The Supreme Judicial Court found no reversible error in the prosecutor's closing argument and declined to exercise its § 33E authority to order an insanity verdict, reduce the murder conviction to manslaughter, or grant a new trial.