People v. Galindo

• Decision Date: 16 June 2022
• Docket Number: 54
• Citation: 38 N.Y.3d 199,191 N.E.3d 1136,171 N.Y.S.3d 865
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Carlos GALINDO, Respondent.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

38 N.Y.3d 199

191 N.E.3d 1136

171 N.Y.S.3d 865

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant,

v.Carlos GALINDO, Respondent.

No. 54

Court of Appeals of New York.

June 16, 2022

Melinda Katz, District Attorney, Kew Gardens (Eric C. Washer, Russell Shapiro, John M. Castellano and Sharon Y. Brodt of counsel), for appellant.

Janet E. Sabel, The Legal Aid Society, New York City (Hannah Gladstein and Rachel L. Pecker of counsel), for respondent.

OPINION OF THE COURT

RIVERA, J.:

The issue presented on this appeal is whether CPL 30.30(1)(e), added to the speedy trial statute and made effective while defendant's direct appeal was pending before the Appellate Term, applies to his case. The amendment requires application of CPL 30.30(1) and its maximum times for prosecutorial readiness to accusatory instruments charging traffic infractions jointly with a felony, misdemeanor, or violation. However, the legislature has not mandated retroactive application of the newly worded CPL 30.30. We therefore reverse the Appellate Term's order insofar as appealed from because the court mistakenly relied on the amended language in granting defendant's motion to dismiss the accusatory instrument.

Defendant was charged in 2014 in a single accusatory instrument with three misdemeanor counts and three traffic infractions under various sections of the Vehicle and Traffic Law. Approximately 17 months later, defendant moved to dismiss the accusatory instrument on speedy trial grounds pursuant to CPL 30.30. The court denied the motion, concluding that the statute did not apply to jointly charged traffic infractions and that the People did not exceed the 90–day statutory time limit applicable to the misdemeanor counts. Thereafter, a jury convicted defendant of two misdemeanors and two infractions and acquitted him of the remaining counts. The court sentenced defendant to a conditional discharge, imposed fines and a six-month vehicle license suspension, and mandated installation of an ignition interlock device for one year and defendant's attendance at a one-day Victim Impact Panel.

During the pendency of defendant's appeal before the Appellate Term, the legislature amended CPL 30.30 to add 30.30(1)(e), which states that the term "offense" includes traffic infractions for the purpose of subdivision (1) of CPL 30.30.¹ The Appellate Term granted defendant's motion to dismiss the accusatory instrument, including the traffic infractions, concluding that the People exceeded the statutory time limit to state their readiness for trial on the misdemeanor counts and that the amendment applied retroactively ( 70 Misc.3d 16, 127 N.Y.S.3d 223 [App. Term, 2d Dept., 2d, 11th & 13th Jud. Dists. 2020] ). A Judge of this Court granted the People leave to appeal ( 36 N.Y.3d 1056, 141 N.Y.S.3d 772, 165 N.E.3d 698 [2021] ).

The People concede that CPL 30.30(1)(e) means what it says—namely, that a traffic infraction is an "offense" for purposes of subdivision (1) of CPL 30.30 —but they argue that the amendment as written fails to achieve its legislative purpose and, regardless, that the amendment is not retroactive. We reject the People's invitation to treat the amendment as a legal nullity and ignore the legislature's intent that traffic infractions jointly charged with the offenses delineated in CPL 30.30(1) be included within the statutory speedy trial framework. However, we agree that the legislature intended that CPL 30.30(1)(e) apply to criminal actions commenced on or after the effective date of the amendment. Thus, the Appellate Term should not have relied on the amended version of the statute to resolve defendant's appeal.²

"The primary consideration of courts in interpreting a statute is to ‘ascertain and give effect to the intention of the Legislature’ " ( Riley v. County of Broome, 95 N.Y.2d 455, 463, 719 N.Y.S.2d 623, 742 N.E.2d 98 [2000], quoting McKinney's Cons Laws of NY, Book 1, Statutes § 92[a]). Generally, "the plain meaning of the statutory text is the best evidence of legislative intent" ( People v. Cahill, 2 N.Y.3d 14, 117, 777 N.Y.S.2d 332, 809 N.E.2d 561 [2003], citing Riley, 95 N.Y.2d at 463, 719 N.Y.S.2d 623, 742 N.E.2d 98 ). Indeed, "[a]s a general rule, unambiguous language of a statute is alone determinative" ( Riley, 95 N.Y.2d at 463, 719 N.Y.S.2d 623, 742 N.E.2d 98, citing Matter of Washington Post Co. v. New York State Ins. Dept., 61 N.Y.2d 557, 565, 475 N.Y.S.2d 263, 463 N.E.2d 604 [1984] ).

In April 2019, as part of a suite of criminal justice reforms, the legislature amended CPL 30.30, adding, as relevant here, paragraph (e) to subdivision (1), which became effective January 1, 2020 (see L 2019, ch 59, pt KKK, § 2). "Although the words ‘speedy trial’ appear in the title to CPL 30.30 and the section is often referred to as expressing a statutory right to a speedy trial," CPL 30.30 actually functions to disincentivize prosecutorial delay by granting a defendant the right to dismissal where the People are not ready for trial ( People v. Brothers, 50 N.Y.2d 413, 417, 429 N.Y.S.2d 558, 407 N.E.2d 405 [1980] ). The statute imposes time limits, defined by the highest graded count, by when a prosecutor must declare readiness for trial (see CPL 30.30[1][a]-[d] ). The amendment did not change the existing times allotted nor did it alter the statutory structure, which provides the greatest amount of time when a defendant is accused of a felony and which affords increasingly less time as the charged offenses decrease in seriousness. As amended, CPL 30.30(1) reads:

"Except as otherwise provided in subdivision three of this section, a motion made pursuant to paragraph (e) of subdivision one of section 170.30 or paragraph (g) of subdivision one of section 210.20 of this chapter must be granted where the people are not ready for trial within:

"(a) six months of the commencement of a criminal action wherein a defendant is accused of one or more offenses, at least one of which is a felony;

"(b) ninety days of the commencement of a criminal action wherein a defendant is accused of one or more offenses, at least one of which is a misdemeanor punishable by a sentence of imprisonment of more than three months and none of which is a felony; "(c) sixty days of the commencement of a criminal action wherein the defendant is accused of one or more offenses, at least one of which is a misdemeanor punishable by a sentence of imprisonment of not more than three months and none of which is a crime punishable by a sentence of imprisonment of more than three months; or

"(d) thirty days of the commencement of a criminal action wherein the defendant is accused of one or more offenses, at least one of which is a violation and none of which is a crime.

"(e) for the purposes of this subdivision, the term offense shall include vehicle and traffic law infractions."³

The text brings traffic infractions, when charged jointly with at least one of the other listed offenses, within the scope of CPL 30.30(1). Reading the amendment in context, the newly worded CPL 30.30(1) puts to rest any question of the legislature's intent that the time limits specified in that provision apply to criminal actions in which a traffic infraction is jointly charged with a higher-grade offense. The statutory framework is hierarchical, as the statutory time frames are set forth in descending order. The statute imposes shorter periods of time within which the People must declare their readiness for trial as the severity of the top charge decreases. Thus, at the highest end of the spectrum, if the action includes at least one felony charge, the prosecution has six months to declare readiness for trial, while at the lowest end, the prosecution has 30 days if at least one offense is a violation and no charged offense is a crime. Contrary to the People's assertion, it was unnecessary for the legislature to have specified a distinct time limit for trial readiness for traffic infractions—non-criminal infractions that are less serious than all the offenses referenced in the statute—since it is obvious that by expressly including traffic infractions within the definition of "offenses," the legislature intended that the prosecution's maximum time to declare trial readiness in a criminal action that includes a traffic offense would be determined by the most serious offense charged. Indeed, at the time the amendment was enacted, there were lower court cases which had concluded that traffic infractions were not offenses for purposes of CPL 30.30 (see e.g. People v. Gonzalez, 168 Misc.2d 136, 137, 645 N.Y.S.2d 978 [App. Term, 1st Dept. 1996] [holding that a traffic infraction was not on "the level of a more serious offense ... (that would) bring the case within the ambit of CPL 30.30"]), although no definitive interpretive pronouncement had been issued by this Court. While that open question lingered for decades, it was well settled that the "general rule articulated in CPL 30.30(1)" is that "the readiness time requirement is based on the most serious offense charged in the criminal action" ( People v. Cooper, 98 N.Y.2d 541, 546, 750 N.Y.S.2d 258, 779 N.E.2d 1006 [2002] ). Our Court had made clear that " CPL 30.30(1) ... correlates the applicable time period to the highest grade of offense charged in a criminal action" ( id. ). We assume the legislature was aware of the state of the law and acted with that understanding in drafting subdivision (1)(e) (see Arbegast v. Board of Educ. of S. New Berlin Cent. Sch., 65 N.Y.2d 161, 169, 490 N.Y.S.2d 751, 480 N.E.2d 365 [1985] ["The Legislature is ... presumed to be aware of the decisional and statute law in existence at the time of an enactment" (citation omitted)]; Hammelburger v. Foursome Inn Corp., 54 N.Y.2d 580, 588, 446 N.Y.S.2d 917, 431 N.E.2d 278 [1981] ["Ascertainment of the legislative intent behind (an) enactment ... requires consideration of the decisional law background ... of which it may be presumed the Legislature was aware"]). Thus, it was wholly logical...