Commonwealth v. Merriwether

How courts have described this case

Verbatim parenthetical descriptions written by other courts when citing this decision. Ranked by citation-network relevance.

• holding that the availability of legal alternatives, including the ability to contact the police, defeats a justification defense
• holding that because the defendant had the legal alternative of contacting the authorities that he could not invoke the defense of necessity
• stating that individual is considered “present” during the execution of a warrant when he knocks on the door while police are conducting a search of the residence
• holding threats of violence received by the defendant over the telephone “do not constitute [a threat of] clear and imminent harm” because “he could have notified the authorities and informed them of these threats”
• court considered oral motion to dismiss made on the record prior to a bench trial
• Police could conduct a protective pat-down search of defendant, whom they had probable cause to arrest for a narcotics violation, and weapon seized as a result of that search was admissible in prosecution for violation of Uniform Firearms Act

Source: CourtListener parenthetical corpus (CC0).