Youngworth v. Commonwealth

General Laws c. 279, § 25, the habitual criminal statute, sets forth the elements required to trigger the imposition of the maximum statutory sentence for the felony on which a defendant is to be sentenced.1 We are asked to determine the validity of a habitual criminal indictment under *609the statute — which requires proof of two prior convictions “in this or another state” — where the indictment rested on one conviction in a State court and one conviction in a Federal court. A single justice of this court concluded that, because a conviction in a Federal court is not a conviction “in this or…