Blog Posts in July, 2015
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Haze Hangs over Nantucket & MV Sounds Re: MA Medical Marijuana
Posted By Brad BaileyMassachusetts is one of a number of states that recently passed a medical marijuana law (in 2012) allowing qualified patients legal access to cannabis. [1] Nonetheless, while voters in the Commonwealth have given medical marijuana the "go-ahead," under federal law, its possession, sale, and cultivation is still illegal. [2] The medical marijuana law in Massachusetts requires a medicinal marijuana ...Continue Reading -
OMG - SJC rules text message now admissible under excited utterance exception to hearsay rule
Posted By Brad BaileyOn July 13, 2015, in Commonwealth v. Mulgrave (SJC-11569), the MA SJC ruled that text messages may be admissible under an exception to otherwise inadmissible hearsay, as excited utterance(s). The related facts are as follows: in March of 2012, the defendant was convicted of murder in the first degree on a theory of extreme atrocity, after being found guilty of stabbing his wife 12 times in their ...Continue Reading -
Middlesex DA Should Avoid Rerunning Boston Marathon Case in State Court
Posted By Brad BaileyLast week, Middlesex County District Attorney Marian Ryan confirmed her Office has begun the process of pursuing the first degree murder and firearms indictments against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev in connection with the line of duty slaying of MIT Police Officer Sean Collier in Cambridge, and the ensuing firefight in Watertown with local police officers and other responding law enforcement units, that were ...Continue Reading -
SCOTUS Clears Up ACCA - Rules Residual Clause Unconstitutionally Vague
Posted By Brad BaileyAmidst all the attention following the Supreme Court's decision to declare bans on same-sex marriage unconstitutional, one case came and went completely under the radar: Johnson v. United States . The Johnson case involves how the federal courts should interpret the Armed Career Criminal Act ("ACCA"), and whether the current interpretation of the ACCA is unconstitutionally vague. Under the ACCA, ...Continue Reading
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