People v. Abdul-Aziz, ABDUL-AZI

• Decision Date: 13 June 1995
• Docket Number: ABDUL-AZI,D
• Citation: 216 A.D.2d 77,628 N.Y.S.2d 272
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Fahim M.efendant-Appellant.
• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division

Page 272

628 N.Y.S.2d 272

216 A.D.2d 77

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Fahim M. ABDUL-AZIZ, Defendant-Appellant.

Supreme Court, Appellate Division First Department.

June 13, 1995.

S. Gliner, for respondent.

M.C. Taglieri, for defendant-appellant.

Before SULLIVAN, J.P., and ROSENBERGER, WALLACH, ASCH and WILLIAMS, JJ.

MEMORANDUM DECISION.

Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Nicholas Figueroa, J.), rendered April 13, 1993, convicting defendant, after a jury trial, of criminal sale of a controlled substance in the third degree and two counts of criminal possession of a controlled substance in the third degree, and sentencing him to concurrent terms of 8 to 16 years, unanimously modified, on the law, to vacate the convictions for criminal possession and dismiss those counts, and otherwise affirmed.

Defendant acted as a steerer by leading the undercover officer to the principals of a cocaine selling operation located in an apartment that appeared to be under the control of one of the principals. All aspects of the actual transaction were conducted by the principals. Defendant never negotiated with the officer, or handled the cash, the contraband or any of the drug selling paraphernalia, and there was no evidence that he had any personal connection with the apartment. The seller told the officer to come back to him and his confederate for future business, pointedly ignoring defendant. Although defendant remained behind when the undercover officer left, presumably to get his tip, he did not linger long in the apartment as he was arrested shortly afterward a block away. When the backup team entered the apartment a half-hour later with a battering ram, the window was open, and bystanders directed police in the direction of the principals' flight. Drug paraphernalia and two bags containing in excess of one-half ounce of cocaine were recovered from beneath a table.

We dismiss the counts charging defendant with possession, which were based on an acting-in-concert theory, not the "room presumption", since the evidence of defendant's transitory and fleeting contemporaneous presence in the apartment, while legally sufficient to prove his participation in the sale, was not legally sufficient to prove his exercise of dominion and control over the cache of cocaine that was left behind in the apartment.

No reasonable view of the evidence supported submission of the agency defense to the jury (People v. Herring, 83 N.Y.2d 780, 610 N.Y.S.2d 949, 632 N.E.2d 1272), although the court erred to the extent that it relied on defendant's denial of participation in the crime as an alternative basis not to submit the defense (cf., People v. Butts, 72 N.Y.2d 746, 748-750, 536 N.Y.S.2d 730, 533 N.E.2d 660). To the...