10/5/26: Judge Stearns has revised and updated the chapters on "Indecent Assaults" and "Drug Crimes" to note new cases and legislative developments on diverse topics, including the first complaint doctrine, victim consent, juror empanelment, expert witnesses, proof of controlled substances, and the restructuring of the Commonwealth's marijuana laws.
9/25/26: Judge Stearns has revised and updated the chapters on "Identification Evidence" and "Public Order Offenses" highlighting new cases on postconviction DNA testing, in-court identification, forensic evidence authentication, and terroristic threats, among others.
9/20/26: Judge Stearns has revised and updated the chapters on "Assault", "Larceny", and "Breaking and Entering", noting new cases on topics such as conversion, proof of "true" threats, fraudulent intent, and the crime of home invasion.
9/13/26: Judge Stearns has revised and updated the chapters on "Consent Searches", "Vehicle Searches", and "Searches with Warrants". Among other new and noteworthy cases is Commonwealth v. Solis (Diaz), 498 Mass. 131 (2026), declining to impose any strict time limit on the interval between the lawful seizure of a cell phone and the application for a warrant to search its contents.
9/7/26: Judge Stearns has revised the chapter on "Search and Seizure: Threshold Inquiries" to incorporate new cases discussing community caretaking, frisks, and reasonable suspicion (or the lack thereof), among other topics. Also noted is Commonwealth v. Palmer, 498 Mass. 117 (2026), in which the Supreme Judicial Court further elaborates on the reformulation of the Mendenhall-Royer seizure test put forward by Chief Justice Budd in Commonwealth v. Motta, 483 Mass. 357 (2019).
7/27/26: Judge Stearns has revised the chapter on "Exigent Searches" to incorporate the Supreme Court's recent decision in Case v. Montana, 607 U.S. 197 (2026), clarifying the distinction between the community caretaking and emergency assistance doctrines. As Judge Stearns notes, Massachusetts law is largely consistent with Supreme Court jurisprudence on the standards governing the warrantless entry of dwellings when police believe that they are facing an ongoing emergency.
7/21/26: Judge Stearns has updated the chapters on "Motor Vehicle Offenses", noting new cases on civil citations, operating to endanger, operating under the influence, and the proper certification of official Registry records, also noting no significant statutory changes in the motor vehicle laws during this past year.
7/15/26: Judge Stearns has revised the introductory chapter on "Search and Seizure" to note new cases discussing wiretaps, border searches, GPS monitoring, and exceptions to the Exclusionary Rule, as well as the seminal case just handed down by the Supreme Court, Chatrie v. United States, a narrow critique of the rarified investigative tool of geofencing that has broad ramifications for the application of the Fourth Amendment and art. 14 to Space Age governmental surveillance.
6/4/26: Judge Stearns has revised the chapters on "District Court Procedure", "Multiple Defendants", and "Juvenile Proceedings", noting new cases on subjects as diverse as bail and detention, exculpatory evidence, conflict of interest, the joint ventured doctrine, confrontation, double jeopardy, and juvenile sentencing, among other topics.
4/19/26: Judge Stearns has revised the chapters on "Assault", "Assault and Battery with a Dangerous Weapon", "Forgery and Uttering", and "Firearms Offenses" to capture recent developments in Massachusetts appellate and statutory law.
4/6/26: Judge Stearns has revised the chapter on "Assault and Battery" to take note of a number of new cases, including Commonwealth v. Santana-Rodriguez in which the Supreme Judicial Court adopts the doctrine of transferred intent self-defense (with an important departure from the law in other jurisdictions which have also adopted the doctrine). The chapter on "Firearms Offenses" has been revised to take note of a number of new cases, among them Commonwealth v. Quahir Q., in which the Supreme Judicial Court authorized Juvenile Court judges to continue without a finding cases charging juveniles with unlawful possession of a firearm, and Guinane v. Chief of Police of Manchester-by-the Sea in which the Appeals Court narrowed the discretion of licensing authorities to deny issuance of licenses to carry based on consideration of extraneous factors.
2/11/26: Judge Stearns has revised the chapter on "District Court Procedure" to note new developments with regard to bail and detention, discovery, and other crimes evidence, among other topics.
1/20/26: Judge Stearns has revised the chapter on Police and Civil Rights to note new state and federal cases governing the law of arrest and civil rights actions among other topics.
1/15/26: Judge Stearns has updated the chapter on "Domestic Abuse" to take note of new penalties for cyber harassment ("revenge porn"). The introductory chapter to "Identification Evidence" has also been revised and updated.