Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley today hailed a decision by the Supreme Judicial Court to uphold a gun-toting drug dealer’s conviction based on evidence recovered in a hotel room from which he’d been evicted, bringing Massachusetts in line with other jurisdictions nationwide.

The state’s highest court yesterday upheld the 2007 conviction of MARK MOLINA (D.O.B. 6/19/83), a former Fenway resident kicked out of the Colonnade Hotel after a series of run-ins with its staff on the night of June 17 and morning of June 18, 2005. Molina was found guilty of trafficking in cocaine, possession of Class C and Class D substances with intent to distribute, and unlawful possession of a firearm and ammunition; he was sentenced to three years in state prison followed by two years of probation.

“The defendant was evicted from the hotel because of his own actions, choices, and behavior,” Conley said. “As a result, he lost any claim to privacy over the loaded handgun and bags of cocaine and marijuana he left there. Massachusetts courts hadn’t previously ruled on whether a hotel guest’s right to privacy ends with his or her eviction. This ruling makes plain that it does.”

Evidence and testimony introduced at Molina’s trial proved that he’d checked into the hotel on June 17 and signed a form acknowledging that he would comply with all local, state, and federal laws and could be evicted if he did not. At about 8:00 that night, the evidence showed, he received a visit from a group who arrived at the hotel carrying beer in violation of the hotel’s policy.

About six and a half hours later, at 2:30 a.m., another group arrived to visit Molina, its members clearly intoxicated and abusive toward the hotel staff and security. Molina was warned that he would be asked to leave the hotel if its staff received one more complaint about him.

Later on June 18, the evidence showed, hotel staff received a call for the strong odor of marijuana coming from Molina’s room, which was located on a non-smoking floor. Responding staff could detect the odor immediately upon stepping out of the elevator. Those staff members knocked on Molina’s door and entered after receiving no answer. Inside, they saw a scale and a large quantity of marijuana. They left the room, double-locked the door, and notified Boston Police.

Prior to trial, a judge ruled that the hotel staff’s entry into the room was lawful, based on their prior interactions with Molina, their observations of his guests, and the odor of marijuana coming from his room. The judge ruled that they were justified in excluding him from the hotel room.

“This action effectively and lawfully ended the defendant’s right to use the room, terminating any reasonable expectation of privacy that he had possessed in the room,” Chief Justice Roderick Ireland wrote for the majority in the court’s 11-page decision.

Detectives went to the room with hotel staff and found an open backpack on the floor stuffed with several bags of marijuana. Beneath the marijuana were a loaded 9mm handgun, a bag of cocaine, and bundles of cash totaling more than $10,000. Detectives seized the bag and its contents. When Molina returned to the hotel at about 11:00 that night, he was placed under arrest.

Based on Molina’s post-Miranda statements to police, detectives obtained search warrants for the hotel room and his apartment. In the former location they found small amounts of cocaine and marijuana; in the latter, they recovered more cash, more cocaine, and a quantity of mescaline. Suffolk prosecutors subsequently indicted him on an array of drug and weapons offenses, leading to his conviction at a jury-waived trial.

“When a guest’s hotel rental period has been lawfully terminated, the guest no longer has a legitimate expectation of privacy in the hotel room,” Ireland wrote. “Several courts, including several circuit courts of the United States Court of Appeals, have concluded in this context that a lawful termination includes a lawful eviction from a hotel room based in part or wholly on a guest’s misconduct.”

Ireland wrote that hotel staff “reasonably believed that the defendant had violated not only the hotel’s rules and regulations, including a violation of the floor’s nonsmoking policy, but also State law concerning controlled substances. [The staff] thus had legitimate and lawful grounds to evict the defendant from the hotel.” Ireland added that “The subsequent police search was undertaken with [hotel staff’s] consent and was, in the circumstances, constitutional.”

Assistant District Attorney Zachary Hillman of Conley’s Appeals Division argued in support of Molina’s conviction. Assistant District Attorney Amy Galatis prosecuted the case at trial. Molina was represented by attorney John J. McGlone III.