Commonwealth v. Renderos

799 N.E.2d 97, 440 Mass. 422, 2003 Mass. LEXIS 822
CourtMassachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
DecidedNovember 24, 2003
StatusPublished
Cited by28 cases

This text of 799 N.E.2d 97 (Commonwealth v. Renderos) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Commonwealth v. Renderos, 799 N.E.2d 97, 440 Mass. 422, 2003 Mass. LEXIS 822 (Mass. 2003).

Opinion

Greaney, J.

A jury in the District Court found the defendant guilty on two counts of a complaint charging him with indecent assault and battery on a person who had attained fourteen years of age, G. L. c. 265, § 13H. The judge sentenced the defendant to terms of one year and two years in a house of correction, to be served concurrently, suspended for two years, and the judge ordered the defendant to stay away from the victim and to register as a sex offender. In addition, the judge sentenced the defendant, pursuant to G. L. c. 265, § 45, to a term of community parole supervision for life. The defendant appealed from his convictions and from his sentence of lifetime community parole. We transferred the appeal here on our own motion. We conclude that the judgments of conviction should stand. We further conclude that the judge could not commit the defendant, a first time offender, to community parole supervision for life, in the absence of a motion from the Commonwealth requesting a hearing to determine whether that sentence should be imposed. See G. L. c. 275, § 18. The defendant, therefore, must be resentenced.

1. The jury could have found the following facts. At about 9:15 p.m. on October 28, 2000, the victim, then sixteen years of age, was finishing her duties as a cashier at a grocery store in Burlington. While organizing items on an aisle shelf, the victim encountered the defendant, also an employee of the store, who was sweeping the aisle. The defendant, who was twenty-seven years of age, made a comment to the victim.1 The victim stopped what she was doing and walked to the front of the store. There she retrieved some damaged items and carried them to a room in the back of the store.

As the victim entered the back room, she again met the defendant, who was mopping the floor. The victim set down the damaged items and tried to leave the room, but the defendant stood at the door. He touched her chest and her crotch with his hands. No one else was in the back room at the time.

[424]*424The victim told the defendant that “he should not be doing this to [her],” pushed him, and ran up a nearby stairway. Reaching the top of the stairs, she went through the employee break room and entered the ladies’ restroom. The victim thought that the defendant would not follow her there. When she came out of the restroom a couple of minutes later, however, the defendant was waiting outside.

The victim attempted to pass the defendant. As she did so, he commented that he liked her a lot and, reaching from behind, touched her breasts a second time. The victim told him to leave her alone. Pulling away from the defendant, the victim ran down the stairs and out into the front area of the store. Shortly thereafter, the victim received permission from the store manager to leave work early. She walked out of the store to the parking lot, where her mother and boy friend waited in her mother’s automobile.

Sensing that her daughter was nervous, upset, and scared, the victim’s mother asked what was wrong. The victim responded that the defendant had touched her “in private areas” and pointed to her breast and to her crotch area. The victim’s mother immediately went into the store and confronted the manager, who telephoned the police. The victim, at times crying, recounted to the responding police officer what had happened.

The police officer found the defendant pohshing the floor of the store. When asked by the officer for his account of what had happened, the defendant initially replied, “I don’t know, what are you talking about?” The officer explained that he was investigating a report that the defendant had “grabb[ed] a young lady.” The defendant responded, “I never touch, I never touch,” and asked if he could tell his version of what had happened. The defendant then mimicked a sweeping motion to demonstrate to the police officer that he had been sweeping the stairs at the back of the store when he, accidentally, had bumped into the victim.

The defendant testified at trial through a Spanish interpreter. He stated that the contact between himself and the victim had been accidental and repeatedly denied that he had sexually assaulted the victim. According to the defendant, the victim had come up behind him while he was sweeping the stairs and he [425]*425inadvertently had tripped her. The defendant testified that the victim called him names which, for the most part, the defendant did not understand, because his English is “not perfect.” He did understand, however, that she called him a “stupid Hispanic.”2

2. We first consider the sole issue raised by the defendant in his appeal from his convictions — that comments made by the prosecutor in his closing argument improperly attributed to the defendant a state of mind for which there was no evidence. We view the challenged remarks “in the light of the ‘entire argument, as well as in light of the judge’s instruction to the jury and the evidence at trial.’ ” Commonwealth v. Coren, 437 Mass. 723, 731 (2002), quoting Commonwealth v. Lamrini, 392 Mass. 427, 432 (1984). Because defense counsel registered no objection, we review any impropriety to determine whether it was so gravely prejudicial as to pose a substantial risk of a miscarriage of justice. See Commonwealth v. Haskins, 411 Mass. 120, 121 (1991).

The decisive issue at trial was the credibility of the victim and of the defendant. In closing, the defendant’s trial counsel argued to the jury that the defendant’s assertions of innocence were fully corroborated by testimony at trial that the defendant, on being questioned by the police officer, at first denied knowing anything about the incident. He stated:

“There was never anything that would indicate that he was aware of anything that was going on. When the officer said to him, what happened, he shrugged his shoulders, I don’t know, he didn’t know what he was talking about. And then when the officer told him about what [the victim] had alleged, his story was the story that he gave today which is consistent with what he said back then.”

Seeking to persuade the jury that the defendant should not be believed, the prosecutor, in his closing argument, cast the same testimony in this manner:

“The police come, question the [defendant. At first the [426]*426[d]efendant denies any knowledge of anything happening because he figures he’s going to get away with this. What happens? The police say, well, actually she told us you touched her. Well, in that case, I just bumped her.”

We agree that there was no testimony at trial that the defendant “figure[d] he [was] going to get away with” the assault or that the defendant stated (either aloud or to himself) “in that case, I just bumped her” before demonstrating to the police officer that he had accidentally bumped into the victim while sweeping. We view the former remark, however, as a fair inference as to the defendant’s state of mind that could reasonably be drawn from the officer’s testimony as to the defendant’s conduct.3 In the context of the entire summation made by the prosecutor, the statement clearly was intended to counteract the argument made by the defendant’s trial counsel that the jury should reach an alternate conclusion with respect to the defendant’s state of mind (which also reasonably could be inferred from the evidence).4 See Commonwealth v. Rodriguez, 437 Mass.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
799 N.E.2d 97, 440 Mass. 422, 2003 Mass. LEXIS 822, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/commonwealth-v-renderos-mass-2003.