People v. Dellarocco
| Decision Date | 21 January 1982 |
| Citation | 86 A.D.2d 720,446 N.Y.S.2d 567 |
| Court | New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Thomas C. DELLAROCCO, Appellant. |
Martin E. Smith, Binghamton, for appellant; Janet Cunard, White Plains, of counsel.
Patrick D. Monserrate, Broome County Dist. Atty., Binghamton (Patrick H. Mathews, Binghamton, of counsel), for respondent.
Before MAHONEY, P. J., and SWEENEY, MAIN, CASEY and MIKOLL, JJ.
Appeal from a judgment of the County Court of Broome County, rendered July 18, 1979, upon a verdict convicting defendant of the crime of criminal possession of stolen property in the first degree.
The indictment charged defendant with knowingly possessing a 1978 Cadillac automobile on April 21, 1978, which vehicle defendant knew or should have known had been stolen. At trial, defendant testified that he was invited by an unknown black male to purchase the vehicle for the reduced price of $8,000 because the vendor needed some ready cash, the tender having been made at Monticello Raceway in Monticello, New York. Since a certificate of title exhibited by the vendor matched the identification number on the car, defendant asked the prospective seller to follow him to Binghamton where the sale would be consummated. On the following day, after defendant allegedly determined that he had insufficient funds to buy the vehicle, he arranged for the sale of the Cadillac to a local priest. Shortly after the sale, on May 13, 1978, the car was impounded as a stolen vehicle.
The People's case relied principally upon proof of other unrelated crimes to show a composite plan or scheme whereby late model Cadillac automobiles were stolen, their vehicle identification numbers altered and reregistered with counterfeit North Carolina titles, routed upstate to the Binghamton area and sold by friends or associates of defendant to innocent purchasers. Pursuant to this theory, testimony of 13 witnesses was elicited bearing upon three separate car thefts. While each illicit transaction began with a theft of a Cadillac vehicle which was reregistered with a counterfeit North Carolina title and sold in Broome County, there was no direct evidence that defendant was a participant in any plan or scheme involving these unrelated crimes. In fact, the People's pivotal witness, Sheldon Stern, testified that while he witnessed and signed as a Commissioner of Deeds each of the forged certificates of title,...
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People v. Ehrlich
...matter of law. It is not left to the jury to decide as a question of fact because of the potential for prejudice. (People v. Dellarocco, 86 A.D.2d 720, 721, 446 N.Y.S.2d 567. See also, People v. Molineux, 168 N.Y. 264, 306, 61 N.E. 286; Fisch, New York Evidence (2nd ed.) § 26. Compare, Peop......
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People v. Miller
...evidence. It is further clear that the trial court determined the question of admissibility as a matter of law (cf. People v. Dellarocco, 86 A.D.2d 720, 446 N.Y.S.2d 567). The factual assessment of this evidence was properly left for the Judgment affirmed. ...
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People v. Weston
...another of these stolen Cadillacs and involving much of the identical testimony, was recently before this court in People v. Dellarocco (86 A.D.2d 720, 446 N.Y.S.2d 567). Therein this court determined that the trial court improperly admitted testimony concerning the extraneous crimes and th......
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People v. Dellarocco
...and ordered a new trial on the ground that the trial court had improperly admitted evidence of unrelated, uncharged crimes (86 A.D.2d 720, 446 N.Y.S.2d 567). Defendant was retried and again found guilty of first degree criminal possession of stolen property. This appeal by defendant Defenda......