People v. Felder

• Decision Date: 28 January 2003
• Citation: 301 A.D.2d 458,754 N.Y.S.2d 18
• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division
• Parties: THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, Appellant,<BR>v.<BR>KENNETH FELDER, Respondent.

301 A.D.2d 458

754 N.Y.S.2d 18

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, Appellant,

v.KENNETH FELDER, Respondent.

Decided January 28, 2003.

Concur — Nardelli, J.P., Tom, Mazzarelli, Buckley and Ellerin, JJ.

The hearing court properly concluded that the People, who concede that defendant's right to counsel indelibly attached in 1994 as the result of an attorney's actual entrance into the matter at issue, failed to sustain their burden of establishing that the attorney-client relationship had terminated several years later when defendant was questioned by detectives (People v West, 81 NY2d 370, 379-381; People v Marrero, 51 NY2d 56, 59).

The evidence at the hearing established that the police were aware that the attorney had entered the case on defendant's behalf in 1994, that he gave them his business card, and that he instructed them not to talk to defendant without contacting him. When the police reopened the investigation in 1999, they made no attempt to contact the attorney before questioning defendant despite the fact that the attorney's name was included in the case file. The mere passage of time is insufficient to eradicate the attorney-client relationship (People v West, 81 NY2d at 379-380), and if there was any uncertainty about the existence of the attorney-client relationship, it was incumbent upon the police to...