Commonwealth v. Lopes

This is the rare case in which a court room closure was ordered over the defendant’s objection during jury empanelment, subsequent to the decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Owens v. United States, 483 F.3d 48 (1st Cir. 2007). That case and the subsequent cases from the Supreme Judicial Court, see, e.g., Commonwealth v. Cohen (No. 1), 456 Mass. 94 (2010), and from the United States Supreme Court, see Presley v. Georgia, 558 U.S. 209 (2010), confirm that a defendant’s right to a public trial under the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution…