Court Opinion

ID: 9782501
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 18:53:05.548224+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:35:03.596415
License: Public Domain

Chief Judge Lippman
(dissenting in Becoats): While I am in agreement with the majority’s resolution of the other issues in the case, I do not agree that the denial of defendant Becoats’ motion for an adjournment was under the circumstances within the permissible range of the trial court’s discretion. Indeed, it appears at the very least highly incongruous to conclude as the majority has, on the one hand, that defendant Wright’s convictions must be reversed upon the ground that erroneously excluded, potentially “decisive” evidence, showed that one of the two prosecution witnesses, Nicholas Carter, “had actually participated in planning the crime,” (majority op at 656) and, on the other, that the trial court’s decision denying defendant Becoats one adjournment to present a witness who would testify that he had actually seen Nicholas Carter, and not Becoats, take part in the crimes, was not also sufficient cause for a new trial.
Both prosecution witnesses had extensive criminal records. Nicholas Carter, in fact, testified in exchange for a veiy generous *657plea offer allowing him to satisfy pending class A-II and B drug felony charges with a probationary sentence. At trial, he recounted that on the evening in question he had been running a bath when his niece informed him that there was a fight going on across the street. He claimed to have watched the fight as it progressed up Joseph Place, and to have seen defendants pull the victim, Spears, into an abutting field, where they were joined by Nicholas Carter’s brother, Sherrod Carter. At this point, Nicholas went inside to take his bath. He testified that, when his bath was over, he observed Sherrod, Becoats and Wright coming out of the field. Wright, he said, was holding a pair of boots.
On August 23, 2005, 20 days before the trial was scheduled to begin, defendant Becoats’ attorney received a letter from the Monroe County Assistant District Attorney assigned to the case. The Assistant opened his communication by indicating that he was writing, “pursuant to [the prosecutor’s] ongoing Brady obligation.” The letter then advised that the District Attorney’s office had learned on August 15, 2005 that a federal inmate named Michael Bishop had information about the Spears case. An interview had been conducted by .the District Attorney on August 17, 2005 during which Bishop stated that he had been present during part of the Spears beating and that although he observed Sherrod Carter, Nick Carter and Jason Wright beating Spears, he did not see Corey Becoats at the scene.
On August 29, 2005, Becoats’ attorney made a letter inquiry of the Assistant District Attorney as to the place of Bishop’s incarceration and the identity of his lawyer. The sought information was provided two days later. After speaking with Bishop’s attorney, Becoats’ counsel asked the United States Marshal’s office about the feasibility of transporting Bishop from the federal correctional facility in Youngstown, Ohio where he was incarcerated to Becoats’ upcoming Monroe County trial. The Marshal’s office was noncommital, indicating that a state court “body order” would be processed in due course and that minimally 30 days notice was required for production of a federal prisoner at a state proceeding.
On September 9, 2005, Becoats’ attorney requested an adjournment of the trial so that Bishop could be produced to testify. On September 12, 2005, before any ruling upon defendant’s adjournment request had been made, the People disclosed for the first time that they intended to call Nicholas Carter as a witness. Inasmuch, however, as Nicholas Carter had been *658implicated in the Spears beating by Bishop, and Bishop’s anticipated testimony would not merely be exculpatory as to Be-coats but would demonstrate that one of the two prosecution witnesses had a motive falsely to implicate others, counsel for Becoats, now joined by counsel for Wright, renewed his request for an adjournment to permit Bishop’s production in court. The trial court nonetheless denied the adjournment, because it was of the view that counsel could have sought a judicial subpoena earlier.
Although our inquiry in judging the propriety of the adjournment denial is limited to determining whether the denial constituted an abuse of discretion — a very tolerant standard that purposefully insulates most judicial decisions respecting the management of a trial from retrospective appellate scrutiny— the range of permissible judicial discretion is generally understood to contract significantly in situations where the adjournment is necessary to the exercise of a fundamental right (see People v Foy, 32 NY2d 473, 476-477 [1973]; People v Spears, 64 NY2d 698, 699-700 [1984]). Fully implicated by defendant Be-coats’ adjournment request was his fundamental right to present witnesses in his defense (see Chambers v Mississippi, 410 US 284, 302 [1973]) and his closely allied right to compulsory process to secure the attendance of such witnesses. Also implicated was his right to confront a key witness against him— Nicholas Carter. I do not believe that, given the basic protections that were at stake, all of which were essential to the fairness and probity of the impending trial, the court, under the circumstances, had discretion to deny Becoats’ adjournment request.
No one disputes that if Bishop had testified in accordance with the account of the crime he gave the Assistant District Attorney on August 17, 2005 he would have provided evidence to the effect that, although he had been present during part of the victim’s beating he did not see Becoats and, moreover, that one of the two prosecution witnesses to the relevant events was himself a participant in the beating he claimed to have witnessed from afar. The obvious materiality of this evidence to Becoats’ defense is impossible to overstate. Becoats’ counsel did not learn about Bishop’s version of the incident until relatively shortly before trial and did not know that Nicholas Carter would testify for the prosecution until, literally, the day of the trial’s scheduled commencement. It is possible to quibble about whether he did all that he possibly could to obtain Bishop’s *659appearance for the scheduled trial, but it is clear that a day here or there would not have made a difference and that an adjournment would, in any event, have been necessary to secure Bishop’s production from the federal facility in Ohio where he was incarcerated. Undoubtedly, rescheduling the trial would have been inconvenient for the court, but it would not have been more than that — there was no contention a postponement would have precluded the presentation of any testimony or other evidence. Nor was there any reason to suppose that Bishop’s attendance could not have been secured within a reasonable time. He was, after all, an identified witness in a federal prison, and there exist established procedures to obtain the attendance of federally incarcerated witnesses in state court proceedings (see CPL 650.30). While those procedures rely for effect upon the voluntary cooperation of federal authorities, there was no reason to suppose that such cooperation would not have been forthcoming.
This was not a situation in which the defendant sought “endlessly [to] pursue an elusive witness” (Foy, 32 NY2d at 478), but one in which the defendant requested a single adjournment to secure the attendance at trial of an identified exculpatory witness whose existence and location had been ascertained by the prosecution in the performance of its Brady obligations. “[M]ere inconvenience is not sufficient ground for denying an adjournment when to do so would abridge a basic right” (id. at 477; see also Singleton v Lefkowitz, 583 F2d 618, 623 [2d Cir 1978], cert denied sub nom. Abrams v Singleton, 440 US 929 [1979]).* Inasmuch as there was no more compelling ground identified for the denial at issue and that denial undoubtedly abridged basic rights, leaving substantial doubt as to the reliability of the verdict, defendant Becoats should, like his codefendant, be afforded a new trial.
Judges Ciparick, Graffeo, Read and Pigott concur with Judge Smith; Chief Judge Lippman dissents in a separate opinion in which Judge Jones concurs.
In People v Becoats: Order affirmed.
*660Chief Judge Lippman and Judges Ciparick, Graffeo, Read, Pigott and Jones concur.
In People v Wright: Order reversed, etc.

 This was a federal habeas proceeding in which Singleton prevailed upon the claim, previously rejected by this Court (People v Singleton, 41 NY2d 402 [1977]), that the trial court had abused its discretion in denying him a continuance to secure the attendance of a material witness in his defense.