In 2022 a concerned citizen called the Chelsea police department and told the dispatcher that a white man wearing a camouflage shirt had a gun. According to the caller, the man held the gun in his hand and then tucked it into his pants. The reporting party made no statements about the man using the gun in a threatening way.
Police responded to the area and confronted a man meeting the description. They surrounded him and conducted a pat frisk. The search uncovered a pistol and alleged drugs. Police charged the man with carrying a gun without a license and possessing a class B drug.
Prior to trial, the defendant’s attorney filed a motion seeking to suppress the seized items. The lawyer argued that the police did not have reasonable suspicion when they searched the defendant. Therefore, the items they seized must be suppressed. A district court judge denied the motion.
The matter went to trial and the defendant was found guilty.
The defendant appealed the conviction on the sole ground that the district court judge erred in denying his motion to suppress. The Appeals Court agreed and vacated the conviction.
The question…is whether, at the time of the seizure, the officers had reasonable suspicion that the defendant was committing, had committed, or was about to commit a crime. Reasonable suspicion must be based on specific, articulable facts and reasonable inferences drawn therefrom, rather than a hunch. (Citations and quotations omitted.)
The justices concluded that the police did not have reasonable suspicion when they searched the defendant.
the caller did not report seeing the man point the gun at anyone, wave it around, or otherwise use it in a threatening manner. Rather, the caller reported only that a man had pulled out a gun and put it in his pants. This did not create reasonable suspicion of criminal conduct. See Commonwealth v. Gomes, 458 Mass. 1017, 1019 (2010) (911 report of man holding gun in air did not justify stop where [t]here was no evidence that the gun had been fired, pointed at another person, or otherwise handled in a way that posed a threat to someone, nor was there evidence that the defendant was a dangerous person”).
The full text of the opinion is attached below.