The Massachusetts Appeals Court today reversed a Falmouth man's conviction for breaking and entering, saying the fact that a taped up ID card in his name was found at the scene was not enough to find him guilty.
The court said prosecutors failed to provide any other real evidence beyond the presence of the card that Ronald Renaud was responsible for the theft of four plasma TVs, a DVD player and sports memorabilia and that without that, they failed to show the man actually burgled the house:
The Massachusetts Appeals Court today overturned a lower-court judge who had ordered a woman with severe mental problems to be sterilized as part of an abortion the judge had agreed with her family to make her have over her objections.
The family of the woman, identified only as Mary Moe, had sought an abortion when they learned she was pregnant in October because otherwise she would have to come off the medications that help keep her somewhat stable - even so, she refuses to admit she is pregnant but says that as somebody who is "very Catholic," she would never agree to an abortion:
The Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today a gun owner was not liable for the death of a man who stole one of his guns then died when the gun went off as he was putting it back at his sister's insistence.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court today reinstated a man's conviction of cruelty to animals for squashing a mother duck leading her ducklings across a mall parking lot in Dartmouth in June, 2009.
A jury found Joshua Linares guilty, but the judge then entered a finding of not guilty, arguing that even if Linares had accelerated right into the duck, the duck had stepped under the car, that the duck was "a wild animal" and that the "defendant was under no obligation to stop, even if he knew he hit the duck."
A divided Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today a man who bought a Norwell house in part because the broker told him it was zoned for use as the hair salon he wanted to open should get a trial to try to persuade a jury he deserves damages because it turns out the house wasn't zoned for that use.
The Massachusetts Court of Appeals today rejected former state Rep. Marie Parente's bid to have her pension increased based on the estimated value of her state-provided parking space on Beacon Hill and her per-diem payments for traveling to and from her home in Milford.
Parente claimed the $1,560 annual value of her parking space and the $7,200 a year she got for travel expenses were part of her "regular compensation" on which the value of her pension should be based - just like William Bulger's housing allowance was used to figure his pension after retiring as president of the University of Massachusetts.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today Chelsea Police acted properly when they went into an apartment and seized a loaded gun after getting a call its owner had shown off his gun and announced he'd been hired to kill somebody with it.
A Chelsea District Court judge had tossed the gun as evidence against Vladimir Samuel, ruling that while police had permission from an occupant of the apartment to enter, lifting the pillow under which a caller said Samuel had placed the gun would have required a search warrant - because the occupant did not give them specific permission to peek under the pillow.
The Massachusetts Court of Appeals today upheld a judge's sentence against a man convicted of repeatedly punching and kicking a pregnant supermarket worker who tried to stop him from shoplifting - a longer sentence that was imposed after he refused to accept probation as a condition of his original, shorter term behind bars.
Gene A. Jackson was convicted for a 2009 incident at the Porter Square Shaw's, involving a loss-prevention officer who followed him out of the store:
The Massachusetts Appeals Court today began a ruling on an insurance issue involved in a 2005 collision off Quincy between a Boston Harbor Cruises ferry and two disabled boats like this:
Sometimes ships do not pass in the night.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today that Housing Court is the wrong place to consider a complaint by two Roxbury tenants that their landlord reacted to a rent dispute by badmouthing them to congregants at the church where they work as custodians - and by trying to get them fired by strewing trash on the church floors to make it seem like they weren't doing their jobs.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court today ordered a new hearing for a college student seeking an extension of a restraining order against a classmate after a lower-court judge said it's a matter for college officials, not the judicial system.
The unidentified woman wanted to continue to have her equally unnamed classmate to stay away from her and her classes on campus after their romance soured and, she claimed, he stalked her and eventually attacked her sexually. But Somerville District Court Judge Neil Walker rejected her request:
The Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today a Roxbury man has to tear down part of the two-unit condo building he put up on Magazine Street because he tore down a neighbor's fence and then built part of the structure where his neighbors used to plant vegetables and repair their cars.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court today reinstated a Chelsea condo owner's lawsuit against her condo trust and management company over leaks she said were so bad she had mushrooms growing on her doorframe and she eventually had to flee the unit on her doctor's advice.
A lower-court judge had tossed Denise Doherty's lawsuit against Admiral's Flagship Condominium Trust, Lundgren Management Group, Inc. and Construction by Design, Ltd. ruling her 2009 suit came after the expiration of the three-year statute of limitations for such actions, because the first leak sprang in 2004.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court has upheld a Newton man's conviction for pushing two Jehovah's Witnesses who'd rung his door - sending one to the hospital with a broken shoulder and arm after she lost her balance and fell.
Neal Farber was arrested on Aug. 13, 2008 after allegedly pushing the two 60-something women away from his house after first screaming at them that he was tired of them and their religion.
Farber acknowledged yelling at the women, but said he didn't push them; both, he said, tripped on his crappy front walkway, in bad need of repair.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court today upheld a Boston Public Health Commission ban on the sale of cigar wraps, saying the commission has a legitimate public-health reason for trying to keep the green leafy material out of the hands of young people.
A group of wrap manufacturers had sued to overturn the regulation, charging the commission was violating manufacturers' constitutional rights - and those of the young black men the group said were the predominant purchasers of the product.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today that even if it bought John Carey's argument that the ex-wife of a friend wanted him to wrap a necktie around her neck and pull it tight enough to cut off her breathing, he'd still be guilty because neither state law nor a Supreme Court ruling on the privacy of sexual acts lets somebody assent to an act that could kill them.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court today tossed part of the drug conviction of a woman who verbally agreed to waive a jury trial but who never actually signed a waiver as required by state law, because she was illiterate.
In 2009, an Essex County jury found Joyce Johnson guilty of cocaine distribution, after which she had a separate trial before a judge on the issue of whether or not this was her second offense - which carries a potentially longer prison sentence:
A Cambridge man will get a new larceny trial because one of the jurors who heard his case may have been snoozing in the jury box.
Felton Dyous had been convicted of using another man's bank card to withdraw $200 from a Central Square ATM when the man mistakenly left it in the machine. Dyous appealed, in part because one of the jurors may have been falling asleep during his short trial - only two witnesses were called.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court today upheld a verdict against a crematory that included a certificate with the wrong woman's information on an urn given to two Dorchester women after their mother died in 2003.
Although the urn itself, the box it came in and the envelope containing a cremation certificate correctly identified the remains as being those of Greta Marie Brown, the certificate had another woman's information on it. In 2007, a Dorchester District Court jury agreed with Kimmy and Joy Brown that that was enough to send them into an emotional tailspin and warrant damages of $100,000 apiece for negligence.
Drive a rental car without authorization from the rental company and you lose your normal right to privacy during a police search, the Massachusetts Court of Appeals ruled today in a case involving a man convicted of drug possession.
Police officers testified when they spotted Antwan Lawson's Dodge Charger just sitting in a crosswalk at Dorchester Avenue and Semont Road, with its lights on and motor running on Oct. 18, 2007, they decided to have a chat with the driver because the car looked like one wanted in connection with a shooting a few days earlier.
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