Court Opinion

ID: 9876630
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-27 15:26:46.016924+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:47:13.116696
License: Public Domain

Acosta, P.J.
(dissenting). In my opinion, the trial court abused its discretion in refusing to submit the air pistol charge to the jury (see Administrative Code of City of NY § 10-131 [b]). On June 8, 2011, at around 1:15 a.m., two detectives were searching for a robbery suspect. As they approached a group of people near 195th Street in the Bronx, Detective Tessitore slowed the car down to five miles per hour, to see whether the suspect was among the group.
As the car slowed, Detective DeLoren saw defendant standing on the east side of the street, to DeLoren’s left (on the driver’s side of their car), four to five feet away, facing the street, with a gun in each hand. Defendant was looking down at the guns. Defendant was standing separate from the group, roughly 25 to 30 feet away from anyone else.
The area was well lit by street lights, and DeLoren had an unobstructed view of the guns. DeLoren and Tessitore testified that as DeLoren looked to his left, out of Tessitore’s side of the car, he told Tessitore, “Stop, stop . . . gun, gun, guy has a gun, back up, back up.”
*63DeLoren looked over his shoulder, and defendant looked at him as Tessitore backed up the car. Defendant turned, made a throwing motion under a white van parked on the street, and started to walk away. DeLoren did not see the guns go under the van, but he heard “two clinks hitting the ground.” Tessitore was watching the road, so he did not see defendant holding any guns as he drove.
The detectives got out of the car and went to different sides of the van. Defendant was on the sidewalk by the van, 10 to 12 feet from where he had thrown the guns. There were people near a building 20 to 30 feet away from where defendant had thrown the guns and 15 feet from where detectives had stopped him. DeLoren arrested defendant and then retrieved the two guns from under the van.
DeLoren described one gun as a black BB gun, or air pistol, and the other as a 9 millimeter Taurus semiautomatic pistol with a brown handle. The 9 millimeter pistol was loaded and found to be operable. The air pistol also was found to be operable. The guns were not tested for DNA or fingerprints, but DeLoren explained that the police gather that evidence only when the suspect’s identity is unknown.
The court held a Settles hearing, at which retired NYPD Homicide Task Force Detective John Bruno, DeLoren, and defendant testified, in order to determine the trustworthiness and reliability of Ramsanany’s statement, a declaration against penal interest (see People v DiPippo, 27 NY3d 127 [2016]; People v Settles, 46 NY2d 154 [1978]). After the hearing, the court granted defendant’s request to introduce Ramsanany’s declaration, and, with defendant’s consent, also allowed the People to introduce evidence of Ramsanany’s recantation.
Defendant presented evidence at trial that he possessed only the air pistol, and that someone else had possessed the pistol before police retrieved both weapons from under a van. Bruno, who had been working as a private investigator since 1985, was hired by the defense in connection with the instant matter. Defendant asked Bruno to talk to a man named “Steve,” whose last name Bruno later learned was Ramsanany. On August 7, 2012, Bruno met Ramsanany at defendant’s apartment, with the understanding that Ramsanany was going to admit that he possessed the gun at issue. Bruno did not, before interviewing Ramsanany, know what kind of gun was involved. Before interviewing Ramsanany, he told defendant to leave. He also *64warned Ramsanany that any admission that he possessed the gun could get him arrested.
Ramsanany then told Bruno that he had been playing dice with people in front of 2650 Marion Avenue, near 197th Street, when a dispute arose between Ramsanany and another player, who slapped Ramsanany. Ramsanany then left and returned with a 9 millimeter Taurus semiautomatic gun, but when an unmarked police car approached, he threw it under a car parked in front of 2650 Marion Avenue. Ramsanany saw defendant throw a BB gun under the car. As police approached, Ramsanany left. He was not promised anything for making the statement, which Bruno put in writing and Ramsanany signed.
Adán Gil, one of defendant’s friends, also testified on defendant’s behalf. At 1:00 a.m. on June 8, 2011, defendant was sitting on a stoop near 2654 Marion. Some people were playing dice nearby, and an argument started between a man Gil knew as “Harlem” and another man. The other man slapped Harlem, who then left, and returned. When Harlem returned, he had a brown gun handle sticking out of his waistband. As Gil heard the police arrive, he saw Harlem throw the gun under a white vehicle. Gil left when he saw the police arrive. He had not paid attention to what defendant was doing at the time. Earlier that day, defendant had shown him a BB gun.
In rebuttal, Detective DeLoren testified that on March 3, 2013, he, Tessitore, and another detective visited Ramsanany’s house, after he had been unwilling to speak to them by phone. They found Ramsanany a block away from his house. When DeLoren confronted Ramsanany about his written statement, Ramsanany “put his head down and sighed heavily.” He admitted that it was a “fake” and a “lie” and that it was defendant’s idea. Defendant had told Ramsanany that if he agreed to say that he had the 9 millimeter Taurus, the case would be dismissed, Ramsanany would not have to testify, and he would not get in trouble. When DeLoren asked why Ramsanany gave the statement, Ramsanany said he was afraid of defendant. DeLoren did not believe that he had the authority to arrest Ramsanany at that point. A few weeks later, Ramsanany called DeLoren and sought assurance that defendant would not learn that Ramsanany had recanted his statement to DeLoren. De-Loren had not taken notes of that conversation, including when it occurred.
At the end of the case, defendant moved to dismiss the charges relating to the 9 millimeter Taurus pistol, and argued *65that only the air pistol count should be charged. The People moved to dismiss the air pistol count, and defense counsel objected, stating, “[T]he jury should be allowed to consider that.” The court stated that the People “have the option ... to make that application. And it is not a lesser included, so I don’t see there is a legal reason for the [c]ourt to include it . . . and were you to object I would deny [the People’s motion], but it is not.” Accordingly, it granted the People’s motion and dismissed the count of unlawful possession of air pistol or rifle.
The court submitted three counts for the jury’s determination, criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree (Penal Law § 265.03 [3]), criminal possession of a weapon in the third degree (Penal Law § 265.02 [1]), and criminal possession of a weapon in the third degree (Penal Law § 265.02 [5] [ii]). The court also instructed the jury that all the charges referred to the 9 millimeter Taurus and not the air pistol.
In its first jury note, the jury requested a readback of Bruno’s testimony regarding his conversation with Ramsanany. Twenty-five minutes later, the jury asked that it be allowed to examine the “two active firearms.” Approximately two hours later, it requested “another reading from you [the court] on what the three counts entail — and how they are different.” The court recharged the jury on the three counts. It also denied defendant’s request that the jury be charged that all three charges referred to the 9 millimeter Taurus pistol.
In my opinion, the court abused its discretion in granting the People’s application to dismiss the count of unlawful possession of an air pistol. As a result of the dismissal, the court only submitted the more serious offenses of criminal possession of a weapon in the second and third degrees, relating to possession of the 9 millimeter Taurus pistol, and concomitantly removed defendant’s only defense from consideration, namely, that he only possessed the air pistol.
I disagree with the majority’s position that submission of the air pistol count “could only confuse” the jury. Indeed, in allowing testimony about Ramsanany’s declaration that he, and not defendant, possessed the 9 millimeter Taurus pistol, the court necessarily found that it did not confuse the issues or mislead the jury (see People v DiPippo, 27 NY3d at 135-136 [“a court must determine whether the (declaration against penal interest) is relevant and, if so, whether ‘its probative value is *66outweighed by the prospect of trial delay, undue prejudice to the opposing party, confusing the issues or misleading the jury’ ” (emphasis added)]).
In any event, under the circumstances, submission of the air pistol charge would not have distracted the jury or merely allowed it to reach a verdict based on mercy or compromise; rather, submission of the charge would have helped the jury arrive at a fair verdict if it had credited the defense, a defense supported by defendant’s and Gil’s testimony and Ramsanany’s declaration, as well as the lack of DNA or fingerprint evidence indicating which pistols were in defendant’s possession. Instead, because the court dismissed the air pistol count, the jury had no basis on which to convict defendant of possession of only the air pistol, and not the 9 millimeter Taurus pistol, even if it credited the defense, leaving the jury to convict defendant of a more serious offense or acquit him altogether. This was particularly troubling, given that Ramsanany did not testify at trial. Any claims by the prosecution that Ramsanany was coerced by defendant into assuming criminal responsibility for the Taurus pistol could only have been explored through Detective DeLoren. It seems to me patently unfair to provide Ramsanany’s declaration and DeLoren’s rebuttal to the jury and then essentially tell the jury to forget about that testimony and focus only on the 9 millimeter Taurus pistol.
It should also be noted that this was not a complicated case, such as one with a 30- or more count indictment; it was actually pretty straightforward, that is, did defendant possess both pistols or just the air pistol? However, by allowing defendant to present a defense based on the air pistol, and then taking that defense away just before the jury charge, the jury was understandably confused. In fact, notwithstanding the court’s charge that all the counts referred to the 9 millimeter Taurus pistol, the jurors nonetheless asked for a “read-back of [Bruno’s] testimony about his conversations with the witness [Ramsanany].” They followed shortly after that with a request to examine both pistols. And when the jurors requested a recharge on the submitted counts, the court denied the defense’s request to charge the jury that the counts only referred to the 9 millimeter Taurus.
Accordingly, in my opinion, defendant is entitled to a reversal followed by a new trial (People v Extale, 18 NY3d 690, 696 [2012]).
*67Kapnick and Kahn, JJ., concur with Tom, J.; Acosta, P.J., and Gesmer, J., dissent in an opinion by Acosta, P.J.
Judgment, Supreme Court, Bronx County, rendered December 18, 2013, affirmed.