GREENFIELD — Justice William Mazanec III of Greenfield District Court expunged a larceny and counterfeit currency case Thursday morning after what criminal defense attorney Isaac Mass said was the “largest case of mistaken identity” he had seen in 14 years.
Eric Moore, a 40-year-old man from Medford, was charged with larceny under $1,200 and uttering a counterfeit note after someone used a counterfeit $100 bill at the Spirit Shoppe liquor store at 402 Federal St. on Feb. 3 — except Moore was working in Boston at the time of the purchase.
“[The police] never interviewed my client. They never asked him where he was, never talked to him at all before they charged him and sent him to court,” Mass said. “Mr. Moore was completely mistakenly identified based on a Facebook post from 10 years ago, dragged into court from the other side of the state, without even a conversation to him about where he was at the time, and had to go through the process of dealing with a criminal complaint.”
Greenfield Police Officer Michael Barone, according to a police report he wrote, was dispatched to the liquor store on Feb. 4 after the manager, Christopher Phillips, called the police to report that someone had passed him a counterfeit $100 bill.
Upon arrival at the Spirit Shoppe, Phillips showed Barone a still image from security camera footage of the suspect— a Black male with a short moustache and beard wearing a “Fox Racing” jacket on top of a gray hoodie — who allegedly paid for three alcoholic beverages with the counterfeit bill and received about $89 in change.
According to the police report, the bill was “reportedly very realistic,” with watermarks and other security measures, but was still flagged as counterfeit when the store attempted to deposit it at Greenfield Savings Bank.
After police were given security camera footage from a Sandri gas station neighboring the liquor store, they saw that the same man who appeared in the Spirit Shoppe’s security camera footage stepped out of the passenger door of a car registered to a Pittsfield woman. Looking the car owner up on Facebook, police saw that she was friends with Moore, a Black man with a short beard and moustache, and in 2015, she posted a photo of him.
“My client was incredulous — very, very angry — that he was being charged with this crime. My first response was, ‘How would he even know that it’s a counterfeit bill?’ Because it’s so good the bank almost missed it, so even if it is him, which my client always said it wasn’t, how would he know that it was a counterfeit bill?” Mass said. “I filed motions for funds to get an expert on cross-racial identification because the police officers involved in the case are white and my client is African American.”
Mass also hired a private investigator to prove Moore’s whereabouts at the time the purchase was made. He said the investigator was able to verify that Moore was working as a personal trainer at InnerCity Weightlifting in Cambridge the evening of Feb. 3.
Four different gym members submitted affidavits to the court confirming that they had scheduled appointments to train with Moore. All four wrote that Moore was present for their entire training sessions.
“There are very few cases where someone’s record is actually cleared. When you’re charged with a crime in Massachusetts, there’s a presumption of innocence, but even if you go to trial, you’re never found innocent, you’re found not guilty. Expungement is one of the few ways that you actually get approved to the world that you are, in fact, innocent,” Mass said. “I’ve never filed a motion for expungement. They’re relatively rare because the standard is, very, very high to get an expungement. You essentially have to be able to prove your innocence, not just that you aren’t guilty.”
Moore could not be reached for comment. A Northwestern District Attorney’s Office spokesperson said the DA’s office assented to the expungement.
