Massachusetts Criminal Defense Attorney Blog
This past Saturday, armed with a search warrant Quincy police officers went to search the third floor apartment at 40 Bradford Street in Quincy. One of the defendants, Alexander Fainer pulled up in his car just as the search was about to commence. He gave the officers the key to the apartment and when they entered the other occupant, Deidre Reilly came to the door with a dog. Rather than securing the dog Reilly let it go and one of the officers was attacked sustaining injuries requiring stitches. During the search officers located about 42 grams of heroin, 9 ounces of cocaine, some pills and counterfeit money. The defendants are being charged with trafficking in heroin, possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, possession of Suboxone and possession of counterfeit currency. The defendants were arraigned in the Quincy District Court. The case will likely be indicted by a grand jury to the Norfolk County Superior Court in Dedham.
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The heroin trafficking charges carry a minimum mandatory 7 year state prison sentence. If there was a school zone within 1,000 feet of the apartment there is an additional 2 year mandatory prison sentence that must be added on to these charges. Possession with the intent to distribute cocaine carries no minimum sentence. Probation can be imposed or in some circumstances with a good lawyer you might be able to get that charged continued without a finding. That is unlikely here in that other substances of a large quantity were involved.
The search warrant and subsequent seizure of drugs always requires scrutiny to see if certain constitutional requirements were met. Lawyers will file motions to suppress searches if they believe that the warrant never should have issued or if there is some evidence that the police lied to the judge or magistrate who issued the warrant. In this case it would be interesting to see who was the target of the warrant, Fainer, Reilly or both. Another issue that might arise is whose drugs were these. Did they belong to one occupant or both. Motions to dismiss are often successful in situations where someone was merely present at the scene but had no involvement in the drug crime.
Drug crimes are a staple of most criminal defense law practices. Several times each week our office is contacted about some type of drug crime. We have won countless drug crime cases. We have done so through motions to dismiss, motions to suppress illegally obtained evidence and trial. We have won drug trafficking cases involving hand to hand sales to undercover officers or informants. If you have any questions about a Massachusetts Drug Crime Case or you believe that you might be charged for a drug crime please call our office now. Attorney Stephen Neyman is a proven successful Massachusetts Drug Crimes Defense Lawyer.
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