Court Opinion

ID: 9807212
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 19:53:53.721348+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:30:08.441406
License: Public Domain

*729Dillon, J.P.,
dissents, and votes to affirm the judgment appealed from, with the following memorandum: I respectfully dissent from my colleagues with respect to the admissibility of the showup identification of the defendant, and vote to affirm the defendant’s judgment of conviction.
The facts on appeal are not in dispute. On July 30, 2010, the complainant met a young man at the front stoop of a friend’s home in the City of Newburgh, and hung out with him and two other friends for approximately one hour. When the complainant announced that she was going home, the young man asked if he could accompany her. During the 10-minute walk, while it was still daylight, the complainant was robbed at knife point by the young man, and the complainant immediately reported the robbery to her uncle at her home. The police were called and responded to the home promptly. The complainant described the perpetrator to Police Officer Myra Rude as a black male wearing a brown-and-white striped shirt. At roughly the same time, Detective Aaron Weaver received a radio call describing the perpetrator as a black male in a striped shirt, and observed the shirtless defendant in the vicinity of the reported crime walking quickly and carrying a striped shirt. The defendant, upon seeing yet another police officer, Christopher Flaherty, ducked behind a parked vehicle.
The defendant was apprehended and handcuffed by Detective Weaver. When the defendant stood up at the time of his apprehension, he dropped the striped shirt on the ground. During a patdown, Police Officer John Maguire recovered from the defendant’s pants pocket a “Sawz-all” with an 8-inch-to-10-inch silver serrated blade.
Officer Rude drove the complainant two blocks to where the defendant was detained, leaving fewer than five minutes after she had first arrived at the complainant’s home. While still in daylight, Officer Rude drove her patrol car toward the shirtless defendant and initially stopped the vehicle 28 to 30 feet from him. When the complainant was asked, “is that him?” she initially hesitated, saying that she could not see well, so Officer Rude pulled the car forward another foot. At about the same time, Officer Flaherty held up in front of the defendant the shirt that the defendant had previously dropped, at which point the complainant identified the shirt. Detective Weaver and Officer Flaherty then draped the shirt over the defendant’s chest, at which time the complainant identified the defendant as the perpetrator of the armed robbery.
The defendant filed an omnibus motion seeking, inter alia, suppression of the showup identification on the ground that it *730was unduly suggestive. After a hearing, the County Court denied suppression.
Showup identification procedures, while disfavored, are permissible in the absence of exigent circumstances when the People demonstrate that it was reasonable under the circumstances, such as by being in close temporal and geographic proximity to the crime, and by not being performed in a manner that is unduly suggestive (see People v Ortiz, 90 NY2d 533, 537 [1997]; People v Ward, 116 AD3d 989, 991 [2014]; People v Calero, 105 AD3d 864 [2013]; People v Johnson, 104 AD3d 705, 706 [2013]).
Here, the People established that the showup identification of the defendant occurred within close spatial and temporal proximity to the commission of the crime (see People v Ortiz, 90 NY2d at 537; People v Duuvon, 77 NY2d 541, 544 [1991]; Matter of Russell F., 118 AD3d 874 [2014]; People v Guitierres, 82 AD3d 1116 [2011]). The identification occurred within two blocks of the crime, approximately 10 minutes after its occurrence.
Contrary to the defendant’s contention, the identification procedure utilized by the police was not unduly suggestive in the manner of its performance. In People v Dennis (125 AD2d 325 [1986]), this Court upheld a showup identification of a handcuffed defendant who had been compelled to don the black jacket and cap that he allegedly wore at the time of a burglary (see id. at 326). Similarly, in People v Mayers (100 AD2d 558 [1984]), this Court upheld a showup identification of a defendant who had been compelled by police to don a black turtleneck that he allegedly wore at the time of a robbery (see People v Mayers, 100 AD2d at 558; cf. People v Brisco, 99 NY2d 596, 597 [2003]; People v Cruz, 31 AD3d 660, 661 [2006]). In my view, Dennis and Mayers are controlling, and the holding of clothing in front of a suspect versus requiring a suspect to wear certain clothing is a distinction relied upon by the majority that is without a difference. '
Significantly, this Court recently had occasion to pass judgment upon the admissibility of a showup identification where, under facts remarkably similar to those present here, the defendant was surrounded by police officers in close geographic and temporal proximity to the alleged crime, and the police held, at waist height, a blue-and-white-striped shirt that was viewed by the complainant at the exact time of the identification. The case, People v Dunbar (104 AD3d 198 [2013], affd 24 NY3d 304 [2014]), involved a defendant who allegedly committed a crime while wearing a blue and white striped shirt, and *731when he was arrested shortly thereafter in a taxi cab, a blue- and-white-striped shirt was found on the floor of the cab. In Dunbar, we held that while the police officer’s display of the striped shirt near the defendant and certain unrelated police inconsistencies might affect the reliability, and hence, weight, of the identification, the showup procedure itself was not rendered unduly suggestive by the presence of the striped shirt (see id. at 215). Clearly, both here and in Dunbar, the police held a striped shirt near each defendant at the time the complainants made the identifications. However, as we concluded in Dunbar, that mere fact does not render the procedure unduly suggestive so as to preclude admission of the identification (see id. at 217).
As for the remaining issues on appeal, the County Court properly denied the defendant’s request for a missing witness charge, as the defendant failed to demonstrate that the witness in question was under the control of the People (see People v Read, 97 AD3d 702, 703 [2012]; cf. People v Gonzalez, 68 NY2d 424, 431 [1986]).
Moreover, the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the prosecution (see People v Hawkins, 11 NY3d 484, 493 [2008]; People v Contes, 60 NY2d 620, 621 [1983]), was legally sufficient to prove the defendant’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Further, upon an independent review pursuant to CPL 470.15 (5), the verdict of guilt was not against the weight of the evidence (see People v Romero, 7 NY3d 633 [2006]). The discrepancies and other circumstances discussed above, while rendering the evidence less than overwhelming, were properly before the jury for consideration (see People v Reid, 82 AD3d 1268, 1268-1269 [2011]; People v Jean-Marie, 67 AD3d 704, 705 [2009]; People v Stroman, 60 AD3d 708 [2009]).
Accordingly, the judgment of conviction should be affirmed.