Commonwealth v. Camacho
Annotate this CaseAfter a jury trial, Defendant was found guilty of murder in the first degree and related charges. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed Defendant’s convictions, holding (1) when assessed through the lens of Commonwealth v. Adjutant, the trial judge did not prejudicially err in excluding both evidence of the victim’s and his friends’ prior violent acts and statements Defendant made to his girl friend; (2) the judge did not err in denying Defendant’s postconviction motion for discovery of gang-related evidence; (3) the judge did not abuse his discretion in refusing to instruct the jury on manslaughter on theories of reasonable provocation and sudden combat; (4) Defendant did not receive ineffective assistance of counsel; (5) certain remarks made during the Commonwealth’s closing argument were improper, but the improper remarks did not create a substantial likelihood of a miscarriage of justice; and (6) there was not basis for exercising the Court’s authority under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 278, 33E to reduce the verdict of murder to a lesser degree of guilt or order a new trial.
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