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Appeals court overturns judge who said cops had no reason to stop a man running away from them on Norfolk Street

The Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today a Boston police officer did nothing wrong in chasing after and arresting a man he suspected was packing a gun late one night on Norfolk Street in Roxbury.

In its ruling, the court overturned an order by Boston Municipal Court Judge Raymond Dougan that prosecutors could not use the gun allegedly found on Olajuwan Jones-Pannell on Aug. 6, 2011.

The appeals court begged to differ with Dougan's assertion that that particular stretch of Norfolk Street was not a high-crime area and that the officer who began chasing Jones-Pannell when he started running away from him had no indications that Jones-Pannell was doing anything wrong at the time. A Supreme Court ruling lets police stop people they suspect of committing or being about to commit a crime if they have reasonable suspicion based on several factors.

Two circumstances counted against reasonable suspicion. The patrolling officers had not received any information of criminal activity in the area on that night; nor did they recognize the defendant in connection to any prior criminal or gang activity. Factors supporting reasonable suspicion included [Officer] Anjos's training and nine years' experience in the district, the history of firearms in the neighborhood, the late hour, the defendant's head movements, his continuous placement of his hand inside his pants, and his accelerating evasion of the police. Under the governing case law, these collective factors establish reasonable suspicion of unlawful possession of a firearm. ... The police had reasonable grounds to conduct an investigative stop and frisk at the moment when the defendant turned the corner at either a walking or jogging pace. Thus, the judge should have denied the defendant's motion to suppress.

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Comments

By at least one side at the hearing on proposed gun legislation.

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Yeah, all the old laws don't seem to do much from discouraging thugs from breaking them and the judiciary has a bad habit of throwing out the charges. Bartley Fox anyone?

Thank heavens a sane judge reversed this and got the guy off the street.

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Cops conduct illegal searches 80% of the time. Then piece together a story in which people like yourself jump all over

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insulting to clowns.

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.

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Clowns are funny or scary performers by profession. They tend to be competent. This "judge" on the other hand.....

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why is this man a judge if he has no motivation to lock up criminals? he needs to find a new job. perhaps a criminal defense lawyer...

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A very big thank you to the Massachusetts Appeals Court.

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A judge should not be motivated to lock up criminals, that should be the motivation of the prosecution. The judge's job is to keep everything in order, determine the legality of the evidence, instructions the jury, hand down sentence when people are convicted, and a hand full of other tasks. A judge's motivation should be to ensure justice, which is a good bit different than just locking criminals behind bars.

Of course,the judge in question here is a moron, but that's another issue entirely.

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does runnning with three Ns mean really fast running?

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It just seems that if there is any impact on getting guns off the streets it will be one thug/gun at a time...

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