People v. Conyers

• Court: New York Court of Appeals
• Writing for the Court: GABRIELLI; COOKE, C. J., and JONES, WACHTLER and FUCHSBERG, JJ., concur with GABRIELLI; MEYER, J., dissents and votes to reverse in a separate opinion in which JASEN
• Citation: 52 N.Y.2d 454,420 N.E.2d 933,438 N.Y.S.2d 741
• Decision Date: 02 April 1981
• Parties: , 420 N.E.2d 933 The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Thomas CONYERS, Respondent.

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438 N.Y.S.2d 741 52 N.Y.2d 454, 420 N.E.2d 933 The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant,
v.
Thomas CONYERS, Respondent. Court of Appeals of New York. April 2, 1981.

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Robert M. Morgenthau, Dist. Atty. (Robert M. Pitler and Meredith Anne Feinman, Asst. Dist. Attys. of counsel), for appellant.

Philip L. Weinstein and William E. Hellerstein, New York City, for respondent.

OPINION OF THE COURT

GABRIELLI, Judge.

Defendant Thomas Conyers was tried before a jury and convicted of several criminal counts in connection with the armed robbery of Marion Dantzler and Grace Johnson. The Appellate Division, however, reversed the conviction after concluding that defendant had been deprived of his right to a fair trial (65 A.D.2d 437, 411 N.Y.S.2d 303). We affirmed the decision of the Appellate Division, in part because, in our view, defendant's right to due process of law had been violated by the District Attorney's use of his postarrest silence to impeach his testimony at trial (49 N.Y.2d 174, 424 N.Y.S.2d 402, 400 N.E.2d 342). The People then petitioned the Supreme Court for a writ of certiorari, seeking a further review of our determination upon Federal constitutional grounds.

While the People's petition was pending, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Jenkins v. Anderson, 447 U.S. 231, 100 S.Ct. 2124, 65 L.Ed.2d 86. In that case, the court held that the use of a defendant's prearrest silence for impeachment purposes does not offend any of the guarantees contained in the United States Constitution. Shortly after Jenkins was decided, the court granted the People's petition for certiorari in Conyers I, vacated our order and remanded the case to our court for further consideration in light of Jenkins (New York v. Conyers, 449 U.S. 809, 101 S.Ct. 56, 66 L.Ed.2d 12), presumably because our analysis in Conyers I touched upon some of the same constitutional issues that were considered in that case. Upon reconsideration, we now adhere to our prior ruling and hold that, absent circumstances not here present, our State rules of evidence preclude the use of a defendant's pretrial silence to impeach his trial testimony. Inasmuch as our present holding is founded upon familiar principles of State evidentiary law, we do not find it necessary to consider whether the use of a defendant's postarrest silence for impeachment purposes is permissible under the constitutional principles articulated in Jenkins or whether the due process clause of our State Constitution (N.Y. Const. art, I, § 6) precludes the use of such evidence to impeach a defendant's trial testimony.

The controversy in Conyers I arose out of the defendant's attempts to place an exculpatory version of events before the jury through his own trial testimony. In an effort to refute the testimony of the two alleged victims, Dantzler and Johnson, that defendant had robbed them at gunpoint after accosting them on the street and forcing them into a nearby apartment building, defendant took the witness stand and testified that he had merely been attempting to collect a gambling debt from Dantzler in the latter's apartment when Dantzler drew a gun. Defendant, according to his own testimony, managed to wrest the gun from Dantzler's control and escape from the apartment with the gun and a pouch containing

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the proceeds of his bet after he and his accomplice, Saunders, ¹ subdued Dantzler and bound his hands. Dantzler, however, was somehow able to free himself from his bonds in time to pursue defendant and Saunders out onto the street. The ensuing chase was interrupted, according to defendant, when a police officer intervened and placed defendant and Saunders under arrest.

Seeking to portray defendant's version of events as a recent fabrication, the District Attorney, over timely objection by defense counsel, questioned defendant about his failure to explain the situation to the arresting officer immediately upon his arrest. Reference to defendant's postarrest silence was also made during the District Attorney's summation to the jury. It was these references to defendant's postarrest failure to speak that ultimately formed the basis of our ruling upholding the reversal of Conyers' conviction.

As is evident from our opinion in Conyers I, our decision in that case, although based upon constitutional grounds, was heavily influenced by our conviction that evidence of an individual's pretrial failure to speak when confronted by law enforcement officials is of extremely limited probative worth (People v. Conyers, 49 N.Y.2d 174, 181-182, 424 N.Y.S.2d 402, 400 N.E.2d 342, supra; accord Doyle v. Ohio, 426 U.S. 610, 617-618 n. 8, 96 S.Ct. 2240, 2244-45 & n. 8, 49 L.Ed.2d 91). As noted in our earlier decision, the individual's silence in such circumstances may simply be attributable to his awareness that he is under no obligation to speak or to the natural caution that arises from his knowledge that anything he says might later be used against him at trial (People v. Rutigliano, 261 N.Y. 103, 107, 184 N.E. 689; accord United States v. Hale, 422 U.S. 171, 176-177, 95 S.Ct. 2133, 2136-37, 45 L.Ed.2d 99). Alternatively, the individual may refrain from speaking because he believes that efforts to exonerate himself under the circumstances would be futile (People v. Dawson, 50 N.Y.2d 311, 322, 428 N.Y.S.2d 914, 406 N.E.2d 771; People v. Conyers, supra, at pp. 181-182, 424 N.Y.S.2d 402, 400 N.E.2d 342). Finally, it is a lamentable but undeniable fact of modern society that some of our citizens harbor a mistrust for law enforcement authority which leads them to shun contact with the police even when the avoidance of contact is not in their own best interest (see People v. Conyers, supra, at p. 182, 424 N.Y.S.2d 402, 400 N.E.2d 342). Such individuals may refrain from speaking to law enforcement...