BOSTON, Nov. 21, 2016—After Suffolk prosecutors were allowed to use witness’ grand jury testimony at a trial scheduled to start last week, the defendant in a 2014 armed home invasion pleaded guilty and was sentenced to prison time, Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said.

ROBERT HECKSTALL (D.O.B. 3/18/83) was set to face trial in Suffolk Superior Court on Nov. 14, but certain prosecution witnesses were unwilling to testify in light of intimidating text messages they had received from an unknown party. Under a 2005 Supreme Judicial Court’s decision, Assistant District Attorney Stacey Pichardo of the DA’s Gang Unit cited those messages, the defendant’s statements that he would not even contemplate a plea until he saw the witnesses in the courtroom, and a prior conviction for witness intimidation, and moved to introduce those witness’ grand jury testimony even without their physical presence.

The 2005 decision in Commonwealth v. Jermaine Edwards – also a Suffolk County conviction – brought the principle of “forfeiture by wrongdoing” to Massachusetts. It holds, as federal courts and those in other states across the country do, that if a defendant threatens or coerces a witness to prevent them from testifying against him or her, then that witness’ testimony to the grand jury may be introduced substantively at trial even though it is not subject to cross-examination.

Suffolk Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Locke granted Pichardo’s motion on Wednesday. Informed that the testimony would be introduced at trial, Heckstall instead pleaded guilty to two counts of kidnapping and single counts of armed home invasion, armed and masked robbery, assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, and assault and battery.  Locke imposed Pichardo’s recommended sentence of seven to eight years in state prison followed by four years of probation, during which time Heckstall must submit to GPS monitoring, stay away from his victims, and maintain employment.

“We will not allow acts of intimidation to prevent justice from being served,” Conley said. “If witnesses or victims are afraid, we’re here to help. Prosecutors will use every option available, from Witness Protection funds to legal principles like this one, to keep the people we serve safe while holding violent offenders accountable for their crimes.”

Had the case proceeded to trial, Pichardo would have presented evidence and testimony to prove that Heckstall was one of several assailants who took part in an armed home invasion on Maple Street in Roxbury on Jan. 28, 2014, during which two victims were held against their will for approximately two hours and one was beaten with a firearm.  The assailants eventually fled with nearly $3,000 in cash and a cell phone.

The stolen cell phone was tracked to an Elm Hill Avenue apartment.  Boston Police detectives responded to the location and activated an alarm on the stolen cell phone, which they could hear coming from inside the apartment upon entering.  Heckstall, who was present, identified the phone as his own; a GPS monitoring device that he had been ordered to wear while serving as a condition of earlier probation placed him at the location of the home invasion at the time that it occurred, the evidence would have proved.

Jassie Senwah was the DA’s assigned victim-witness advocate.  Heckstall was represented by Rebecca Kratka.

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All defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.