Justia New York Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Defendant was convicted of first-degree robbery, third-degree weapon possession, and second-degree menacing. On appeal, defendant contended that the People's proof was legally insufficient to establish his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt under People v. Ledwon. The court held that the limited rule of Ledwon did not govern on these facts and the proof at trial was sufficient to support defendant's conviction despite the evidentiary discrepancies. Nevertheless, an unduly suggestive pretrial identification procedure entitled defendant to a new trial preceded by an independent source hearing. View "People v Delamota" on Justia Law

Petitioners brought these Article 78 proceedings to challenge, among other things, their placement on involuntary leave without having been provided a hearing pursuant to Civil Service Law 72. At issue was whether Civil Service Law 72, which provided certain procedural safeguards to a public employee when placed on an involuntary leave of absence, applied to employees who were prevented from returning to work following a voluntary absence. The court held that it did and the order of the Appellate Division was reversed and the judgment of Supreme Court reinstated. View "Matter of Sheeran v New York State Dept. of Transp.; Matter of Michelle Birnbaum v New York State Dept. of Labor" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of first-degree rape, first-degree sexual abuse and endangering the welfare of a child. At issue was whether Supreme Court abused its discretion when it dismissed a hearing-impaired prospective juror for cause. The court held that Supreme Court did not abuse its discretion by granting the cause challenge to venire member 1405 because the record supported the determination that his hearing impairment would have unduly interfered with his ability to be a trial juror. Defendant's remaining contentions did not require reversal. Accordingly, the order of the Appellate Division was affirmed. View "People v Guay" on Justia Law

Defendant was indicted on one count of first-degree robbery and on one count of grand larceny in the fourth degree. At issue was whether defendant's written statement threatening to shoot a robbery victim with a gun constituted legally sufficient evidence that he was in actual possession of a dangerous instrument at the time of the crime to support the charge of robbery in the first degree. The court held that a defendant's statement that he was in possession of a dangerous instrument, standing alone, did not supply sufficient proof to establish actual possession of a dangerous instrument at the time of the crime to support the charge of first-degree robbery. The court held that this type of statement - whether in the form of a verbal threat or a handwritten note - not only established the threat of physical force necessary to support the charge of third-degree robbery. Accordingly, the People must furnish additional proof, separate and apart from a defendant's statement, that would permit a rational fact finder to infer that a defendant was in actual possession of a dangerous instrument. View "People v Grant" on Justia Law

Defendants, Makeda Davis and Fayola McIntosh, where charged with offenses stemming from an altercation at a nightclub. The primary issue on appeal was whether the People's withdrawal of their cases from the first grand jury presentation due to witness unavailability constituted the functional equivalent of a dismissal pursuant to CPL 190.75 and the court's holding in People v. Wilkins. In Davis, the court held that the order of the Appellate Division should be reversed because the People had instructed the first grand jury that only McIntosh was the target of the proceedings. Since the People never sought an indictment from the first grand jury against Davis, Wilkins was irrelevant since there were no charges against Davis to be withdrawn. With respect to McIntosh, it was undisputed that she was a target of both grand jury presentations. The court held that the People's withdrawal of the charges under the circumstances did not constitute a dismissal under Wilkins and the People were not therefore required to obtain court authorization before re-presenting the case to another grand jury. Accordingly, the orders of the Appellate Division in both Davis and McIntosh were reversed and the cases remitted for reconsideration. View "People v. Davis; People v. McIntosh" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his conviction, upon a jury verdict, of criminal sale of a controlled substance in the third degree and criminal sale of a controlled substance at or near school grounds. Defendant argued that the withdrawal of the presented counts from the first grand jury constituted a dismissal under People v. Wilkins. The Appellate Division held, instead, that as a matter of statutory interpretation, a failure of a grand jury to agree on either an indictment or a dismissal was not a dismissal and thus did not require leave to re-present. The court held that, although Criminal Procedure Law 190.75(3), read literally, required the People to obtain judicial permission for the resubmission of charges only where the charges have been actually dismissed, it had long been the law that a charge could, under certain circumstances, be deemed "dismissed" within the meaning of CPL 190.75(3) when a prosecutor prematurely took the charge from the grand jury, as is the case here. Accordingly, the order of the Appellate Division was reversed and the indictment dismissed with leave to the People to apply for an order permitting resubmission of the charges to another grand jury. View "People v. Credle" on Justia Law

A jury convicted defendants, Corey Becoats and Jason Wright, of second degree (depraved indifference) murder and first degree robbery. The Appellate Division modified by reducing the murder convictions to manslaughter in the second degree, and otherwise confirmed. Defendants subsequently appealed their convictions. The court rejected most of defendants' arguments, but concluded that Wright was entitled to a new trial because of an error in excluding evidence he tried to present in his defense. Accordingly, in Becoats, the order of the Appellate Division was affirmed and in Wright, the order of the Appellate Division was reversed and the case remitted to the Supreme Court for a new trial. View "People v. Becoats; People v. Wright" on Justia Law

The primary issue in these appeals was whether the jury verdicts convicting defendants of assault but acquitting them of criminal possession of a weapon were legally repugnant. The court concluded that, based on the instructions that were given to the juries and viewed from a theoretical perspective without regard to the evidence presented at defendants' trials, it was possible for the juries to acquit defendants of weapon possession but convict them of assault because the former crime contained an essential element that the latter did not: possession. Because the repugnancy analysis required the court to review the elements of the offenses as charged to the jury without regard to the proof that was actually presented at trial, the court could not say that the convictions were repugnant. Therefore, under the People v. Tucker test, the court held that, based on the instructions that were used to the juries, the verdicts in these cases need not be invalidated. In Muhammad, the order of the Appellate Division was affirmed. In Hill, the order of the Appellate Division was modified by remitting to that court for further proceedings. View "People v. Muhammad; People v. Hill" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of assault in the first degree and sentenced to 25 years imprisonment to be followed by 5 years postrelease supervision. In this case, turning on the accuracy of eyewitnesses' recognition of an assailant's partially concealed face, at issue was whether two additional eyewitness identifications sufficiently corroborated the victim's identification of defendant, so as to render expert testimony on eyewitness recognition memory unnecessary. The court held that they did not and that it was error to exclude much of the proposed testimony. Accordingly, the order of the Appellate Division should be reversed and a new trial ordered. View "People v. Santiago" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of murdering his father and the attempted murder of his mother while they slept. On appeal, defendant claimed that his federal constitutional right to confront the witnesses against him was violated by the admission at his criminal trial of testimony that his gravely injured mother nodded affirmatively when asked by the police if he was her assailant. The court held that, even assuming without deciding, that the testimony about the nod was constitutionally infirm, any error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt where there was overwhelming evidence that placed defendant at the family home when the crimes for which he was convicted were committed there. View "People v. Porco" on Justia Law