MA: Six month old info of possession of a gun requires something else to show it was ongoing to not be stale

A single firearm seen in the house six months before the search warrant was sought, without some evidence possession was ongoing, wasn’t enough to overcome staleness. Commonwealth v. Hart, 2019 Mass. App. LEXIS 43 (Apr. 11, 2019):

We conclude that the affidavit submitted with the warrant application failed to provide a timely nexus between the informant’s observation of the firearm and the location to be searched. First, we are unpersuaded by the State and Federal cases cited by the Commonwealth where dated observations of a firearm were found to be timely. In each of the cases cited by the Commonwealth, there was other evidence suggesting that possession of the gun was continuous. For example, … “stacks of firearms and a gun safe” in the defendant’s home on several occasions, and two police officers saw “numerous rifles” in the bedroom in the course of making an arrest. … [Or] sufficient evidence to show a “continuous illegal presence of a number of weapons in the defendant’s residence over extended periods of time” to the point where the timing of the executing of the warrant became “of less significance.” … [Or] the police were searching for a number of guns, including a machine gun, and the informant had provided “considerable additional information” that indicated that the firearms remained in the home. … A staleness inquiry is necessarily fact-driven, and all of the cases cited by the Commonwealth had substantial facts beyond the timing of the most recent observation from which it could be reasonably inferred that possession of the firearms was continuous. None of those cases, unlike our own, featured an isolated observation of one weapon by a single individual.