Rodwell v. Commonwealth

Pursuant to the “gatekeeper” provision of G. L. c. 278, § 33E, a single justice of this court has reported to the full court the sole question whether James Rodwell (defendant) has waived his claim, first raised in his fifth motion for postconviction relief, that his conviction for armed robbery is duplica-tive of his conviction for murder in the first degree and, accordingly, that his sentence for armed robbery is illegal. We conclude that the defendant has waived this claim.

We briefly summarize this case’s lengthy procedural history. In 1981, a jury convicted the defendant of murder in the…