Summary
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court affirmed Jarm Perez’s convictions for two counts of murder in the first degree. The court held that evidence of Perez’s alleged assault on a prosecution witness was admissible as consciousness-of-guilt evidence, that limits on cross-examination were within the trial judge’s discretion, and that prosecutorial misstatements in closing argument did not warrant reversal. The court also rejected challenges to the malice instruction and to the lack of unanimity regarding the specific Cunneen factors supporting extreme atrocity or cruelty, and found no basis for relief under G. L. c. 278, § 33E.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether evidence that Perez assaulted prosecution witness Jerome Moton in jail was admissible to show consciousness of guilt.
- Whether the trial judge improperly limited cross-examination of the lead detective concerning possible alternative suspects and alleged inadequacies in the police investigation.
- Whether technically inaccurate statements in the prosecutor's closing argument constituted reversible error.
- Whether the jury instruction permitting an inference of malice from the intentional use of a dangerous weapon was erroneous.
- Whether the jury was required to unanimously agree on the particular Cunneen factors supporting murder by extreme atrocity or cruelty.
- Whether the convictions or verdicts should be reduced or a new trial ordered under G. L. c. 278, § 33E.
Holdings
- Evidence of threats or intimidation of a key prosecution witness is admissible to demonstrate consciousness of guilt, and the trial judge did not err in admitting evidence that Perez assaulted Moton and later made a conciliatory statement to him.
- The judge did not violate Perez's confrontation or cross-examination rights by preventing speculative questioning of the lead detective about alleged drug thefts by the victims and possible alternative suspects.
- The prosecutor erred by inaccurately stating that Perez told Gonzalez that he chased Negron and that he had to kill the victims before they killed him, but the errors were not reversible.
- The instruction that the jury could infer malice from the intentional use of a dangerous weapon was correct, including in connection with first-prong malice based on an intent to kill.
- The Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments do not require juror unanimity as to the particular Cunneen evidentiary factors supporting a finding of extreme atrocity or cruelty, so long as the jury unanimously finds the element or theory of extreme atrocity or cruelty beyond a reasonable doubt.
Key quotations
“The right to cross-examine is not absolute, but is subject to the judge’s broad discretion.” (150)
“Prosecutors must limit the scope of their arguments to facts in evidence and inferences that may be reasonably drawn from the evidence” (151)
“This line of cases “does not require that there be unanimity on every evidentiary factor supporting an element of a crime.”” (156)
Factual background
Two men, Lisandro Medina and Edward Negron, were fatally shot near Bell Rock Road in Fall River on July 13, 2001. Ballistics evidence linked the shootings to an M-1 carbine, which Perez had purchased approximately one week earlier; Perez later asked a friend to conceal and dispose of the rifle. Perez also told that friend that he had gone to the reservation and murdered two people, explaining that he killed them before they could do anything to him. The Commonwealth presented additional evidence placing Perez with the victims shortly before the shootings and showing that his accounts to police changed.
Procedural history
A jury found Perez guilty of two counts of murder in the first degree. The Supreme Judicial Court reviewed the asserted trial errors and conducted the required independent review under G. L. c. 278, § 33E. It found no reversible error and declined to reduce the verdicts or order a new trial.