Commonwealth v. Young
Annotate this CaseDefendants Michael and Janie Young placed their unborn child up for adoption. Defendants received payments totaling $4,000 from Act of Love Adoptions of Boston, Massachusetts and $6,000 from Jeff and Tracey Scholen. When Defendants informed the Scholens that they did not want to proceed with the adoption, Defendants were charged with theft by deception over $10,000. Defendants were later indicted by a grand jury. Defendants filed a motion to dismiss the indictment, which the trial court denied. Defendant subsequently entered into conditional pleas of guilty to theft by deception over $10,000, reserving the right to appeal the denial of their motion to dismiss. The court of appeals reversed, concluding that the charges should have been dismissed because no crime occurred. The Supreme Court (1) reversed the court of appeals and the decision of the circuit court denying the motion to dismiss, as the Commonwealth stated enough in the indictment to proceed to trial; and (2) affirmed the court of appeals to the extent that it set aside Defendants’ conviction on the grounds of palpable error creating a manifest injustice, as it was improper to add the funds paid by Act of Love to reach the $10,000 amount where thefts from different victims give rise to separate offenses and cannot be aggregated.
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