Here’s an update on how the Massachusetts District Courts are adapting to COVID-19:
Q. Are all of the District Courts open during the COVID-19 crisis?
A: Yes, all District Courts are open to conduct certain designated business and to conduct hearings in certain designated matters. As of July 13, some proceedings will take place in person. Other business is instead being addressed virtually by telephone, videoconference, email or comparable means. These are called “virtual hearings.”
If you’ve been charged with a criminal offense in Massachusetts, and your case is currently pending, then yes, the current coronavirus or Covid-19 situation is definitely going to impact the timeline and management of your case. It’s important that you understand how this pandemic has impacted the Trial Courts throughout Massachusetts. What follows is a brief breakdown of how the courts in Massachusetts are handling this crisis, as of today’s date:
On March 17, 2020 the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court issued a standing order closing all courts for all non-emergency matters until at least April 6, 2020. That guide can be found by clicking here.
From March 17 to April 6 2020:
While we’ve all been hearing about Coronavirus for the past two weeks or so, this past week has seen the most drastic and impacting of events surrounding this subject:
Seemingly, almost everything has been shut down around us: Important government offices & agencies, colleges & universities, grammar & high schools, sports games, businesses left & right. Uncertainty seems to be the order of the day.
Unfortunately, regardless of this virus and the measures being taken to deal with it, many people will still face a variety of criminal law problems, both major and minor, during this period of uncertainty. As a result, our office has been receiving a lot of calls from existing and potential new clients, wanting to know both what the situation is with the court system, and wanting to know if they could still meet with me as their cases move forward, or if other legal problems suddenly develop. As for meeting with me, the answer is, yes. No one here has tested positive for this virus, and so long as clients that need to meet with me also have not tested positive for this virus, I am happy to meet with you at your home, as my website advertises, and obviously also speak with you by phone. No one who is facing a serious legal problem or issue should delay speaking with or meeting with an attorney due to this present issue. Continue reading
In my previous post on this subject, explained that I believe that Suffolk County District Attorney Rachel Rollins is ill-fit for the job of top county prosecutor in Boston. My view is that her views on the purpose and role of prosecutor – offered by her under the guise of being a “criminal justice reformer” – (how vaguely ‘positive’) endanger the public safety, and in fact frustrate the goals of criminal justice, instead of advancing them. As it turns out, the timing for this second post could not be better, and the reason for this is the embarrassing and dangerous conduct Rollins put on full display in Boston Municipal Court these past few days. Those actions followed the arrest by Boston Police of approximately 36 defendants at last weekend’s Straight Pride parade in downtown Boston. Many of those defendants were charged with violently attacking not only parade participants, but Boston police officers as well. At least four officers were injured seriously enough to not be able to report to work following these assaults.
Almost all those protesters arrested at the Straight Pride parade were members of a violent leftist extremist group calling themselves “Antifa” (supposedly, for anti-fascism). This group is known for advocating violence to achieve their leftist (socialist) objectives, and in order to hide their identities many of them wear black hoods (remind you of anything similar, in U.S. history?) According to official statements from the Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association, many of these individuals came here from outside Massachusetts, specifically to agitate and engage in violence at this licensed parade. As a Boston criminal defense lawyer with more than 30 years of experience, I very much believe this assessment by the police union. Further, these protesters were witnessed by hundreds of people along the parade route, screaming profanities at parade participants, making obscene gestures, and shouting threats of physical violence against anyone in the parade who dared to disagree with their views.
Many of these protesters were seen hurling containers of liquid at parade marchers that were later determined to contain dangerous and caustic ingredients, such as bleach, other dangerous chemicals and even urine. Their threats of violence escalated to actual violence when many of these protesters rushed the parade marchers, physically assaulting and battering them. When Boston police officers rushed in to stop the mayhem, these protesters then attacked the police officers themselves. The attacks against police became so severe that officers were forced to use pepper spray against them. These protesters, mind you, are liberal extremists that promote themselves as seeking “peace”, “equality”, and “social justice”. Continue reading
I have a major issue with Suffolk County District Attorney Rachel Rollins. I believe that this new District Attorney – an elected position whose job it is to be the chief prosecutor for Suffolk County – is acting in ways that are contrary to the responsibilities of that office, and contrary to the interests of public safety.
Before I explain why, a little primer on the operational structure of the criminal court system in Massachusetts: Courts in Massachusetts, both District Courts and Superior Courts, are organized by county. There are 14 counties in this state, running from Berkshire County, Hampshire County and Hampden County in western-most part of the state, to Barnstable County, Dukes County and Nantucket Counties in the eastern-most parts of the state. These counties vary in size and political demographics, with Middlesex County having the largest population (approximately 1,500,000) and Nantucket County the smallest population (approximately 10,000).
Criminal cases in each county are prosecuted by the District Attorney’s office in that county. While those cases are in everyday practice prosecuted by dozens of appointed Assistant District Attorneys in each county, the District Attorney is an elected position: He or she is, whether they like to say so or not, a politician who runs for elected office. The DA is the chief prosecutor in each county, even though almost none of the elected DA’s actually tries cases in court. Nonetheless, each elected DA is the figurehead for that particular county District Attorney’s office. Their job responsibility is singular: Prosecute persons who have either been arrested, indicted, or otherwise charged with criminal offenses in that county. Their jobs are to ensure public safety and public order. Indeed, reflecting this public responsibility, they are by state statute considered law enforcement officers.
I was interviewed by the Boston Globe yesterday about the testimony that unfolded before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee surrounding Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court. Before going any further, I’m going to say something very sincerely, and I want my readers to know that mean it 100 per cent: I have all the sympathy, and yes, empathy, for anyone who advances a credible, believable claim of sexual abuse, indecent assault & battery, or rape by another person. Man or woman. Young or old. Any background whatsoever. But when such accusations are made, and the accused’s life and welfare are on the line – never mind the stakes involved in the instant matter with the Supreme Court – such accusations must be supported by persuasive, compelling testimony produced by the critical procedural element of cross-examination. If not, they remain what we have here, now: Uncorroborated accusations.
Let me also get something else – something very important – out of the way now: I direct this specific comment to the radical elements of the #MeToo movement, who denigrate and assassinate the characters and motives of anyone who dares to disagree with them, or call into question their motives about matters involving allegations of sexual abuse: Such people are immediately maligned by militant feminists as being fossilized, backward thinking relics of 50+ years ago – the intellectual and social equivalents of knuckle-dragging troglodytes. And one word never spared in their attacks on anyone who has the audacity to disagree with them? “Misogynist”, of course. (“Women-hater” is often thrown in for good measure.) To those militants I say: Save it – That won’t work with me. That’s because I see people as gender-neutral. I don’t judge people based on gender, or ethnicity, or anything else other than their deeds and actions; in the words of MLK, “The content of their character.” Trite, isn’t it? But I happen to firmly believe in that ideal.
Dr. Christine Blase Ford gave some emotionally riveting testimony yesterday. From my distance, it seems quite possible that something happened to her in her past, involving some kind of sexual assault. And if that is so, anyone with any decency, compassion or empathy would feel for her. But amidst all the drama raised by her testimony, here are facts that collectively pose inescapable problems with her testimony:
Anyone who reads a newspaper, surfs the internet of listens to radio, knows about the overflow of legitimacy, ethics and personnel problems inside the Massachusetts State Police.
Now, before loyalists and aficionados of the state police get all worked up that I’m “attacking” or “dumping on” the state police, I’m not. I have known and now know several honest, ethical, productive state troopers, as well as administrative personnel who work for the state police. But something is wrong at this agency, and there’s no denying it.
Just a few of the revelations staining the department in the past few months:
Thinking about Halloween this past weekend, brought me back to when I was a kid growing up in Brookline, Mass. People decorated their homes with pretty standard Halloween stuff: Gravestones that say “RIP,” ghosts hanging from trees, spider webs, and pumpkins. For all of my life, these are the kinds of things that signified Halloween. Scary? Hardly. But these things have always been associated with Halloween, and they always did the trick. Little more was needed.
That’s why, as a Boston, Massachusetts criminal defense lawyer, I’m appalled – and disgusted to be more exact – at how the commercial Halloween haunted house business has grown to a billion-dollar a year business, and how it goes to extremes to attract customers.
Live-actor displays involving:
I defend people accused of crimes. Some of those crimes involve drunk driving. A surprisingly high number of those arrests can be remarkably benign and legally unjustified, and in those cases I am proud to fight my hardest to bring out the facts and to defend my client’s legal, constitutional rights. Almost all the time, no one is injured in these cases, and the persons that I represent are not low-life social reprobates.
But if you’re in the mood for an outrage-inducing legal story, read on. Just be ready to spit nails in anger or disgust. I wouldn’t blame you if you did.
The bare facts: Drunken driving case. Four people killed. Horribly grieving victims left forever more without their loved ones. Nine people injured. Two gravely; one so gravely he cannot move or talk due to brain injuries suffered in the carnage. He probably never will; his fate is in a way worse than death: Completely paralyzed, he can apparently communicate only by blinking his eyes to signal “yes” and no.”
What is wrong with people in this country and in this state, that they won’t get the message that texting and smartphone use while behind the wheel, is a death wish? I’ve asked that question so many times that I’ve lost count, because no matter how much carnage occurs on the roads due to distracted driving in Massachusetts, and what laws are passed, people just can’t seem to put these foolish things – that were originally invented to make our lives easier, but which in fact have taken ourselves over like some kind of addiction – down while driving.
As a Boston, Massachusetts distracted driving lawyer, I’ve seen too many examples of Massachusetts motor vehicle accidents caused by texting and driving. Many of the injuries that result from texting and driving accidents are extremely serious. The motorists who pass by the scenes of these accidents gawk with typical curiosity, but does it cause them to change their own behavior? Shockingly, almost never. Perhaps one of those onlookers has been you?
An estimate by the National Safety Council claims that over 213,000 car accidents in the U.S. in 2011 involved texting while driving, 53,000 higher than in 2010. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that nearly a third of Americans had either e-mailed or texted on while they were driving in a one month period. Many think they’ll get away with it unscathed and unharmed. Many more are wrong — dead wrong.
The Kickham Comment - Boston Criminal Attorney Blog
