People v. Geoghegan

• Decision Date: 03 July 1980
• Citation: 409 N.E.2d 975,51 N.Y.2d 45,431 N.Y.S.2d 502
• Parties: , 409 N.E.2d 975 The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Henry GEOGHEGAN, Respondent.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

Page 502

431 N.Y.S.2d 502

51 N.Y.2d 45, 409 N.E.2d 975

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Henry GEOGHEGAN, Respondent.

Court of Appeals of New York.

July 3, 1980.

Steven G. Eckhaus and Zoltan Hankovszky, New York City, for respondent.

Robert M. Morgenthau, Dist. Atty. (Amyjane Rettew, New York City, and Robert M. Pitler, Syracuse, of counsel), for appellant.

OPINION OF THE COURT

PER CURIAM.

The issue on this appeal is whether a statement made by an accomplice, characterized as a declaration against penal interest, was properly admitted against the defendant. We conclude that it does not satisfy the tests for admission of a statement against penal interest laid down in People v. Maerling, 46 N.Y.2d 289, 413 N.Y.S.2d 316, 385 N.E.2d 1245, and that the defendant's conviction, therefore, may not stand. Because we decide that the statement cannot be admitted under this exception to the hearsay rule we do not consider whether the defendant's right of confrontation guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment has been violated.

The defendant was convicted after a jury trial of second degree murder and first and second degree robbery in connection with the death of a wealthy homosexual. The Appellate Division, 68 A.D.2d 279, 416 N.Y.S.2d 802, reversed the conviction and we affirm. The facts relevant to this appeal were testified to by Detectives John Toone and Carl Sgrizzi and by Thomas Gilligan, a participant in the crime who co-operated with the prosecution and was permitted to plead guilty to attempted second degree robbery. Principally as told by Gilligan the events surrounding the murder were as follows:

The victim had been at various times the friend and lover of Gilligan, Robert Hoke and one Robert Jones. ^* Gilligan, Hoke, and Jones, had become acquainted with the defendant and one Chris Denim. In October, 1975, at a party attended by Gilligan, Hoke, Jones, the defendant, the defendant's brother and possibly Denim, there was a general discussion about obtaining money without labor, by means such as robbing the victim.

The next month Denim, Gilligan, Jones, and the defendant, decided to obtain money from the victim by telling him, falsely, that bail money was needed for Sherman. If that did not work, they intended to rob him. At the building the defendant and Denim went upstairs to the victim's apartment while Jones and Gilligan waited for a while in the vestibule. When they reached the apartment the defendant, holding a knife, was standing over the victim's body. After being threatened by the defendant, Gilligan opened a file cabinet which he knew to contain valuables, then fled from the scene.

Shortly after the murder Jones was questioned by the police, but denied his own participation or having recently seen Gilligan, and offered to help the police find Gilligan. Gilligan was arrested December 3, 1975.

The defendant and Jones were separately arrested early on December 4, 1975 by Detectives Toone and Sgrizzi. According to the detectives Jones, upon seeing Gilligan and the defendant in custody, gave an account of the crime which was basically the same as that given by Gilligan at the trial. Jones thereafter testified before the Grand Jury but refused to testify at the defendant's trial after the prosecutor declined to give consideration to his co-operation.

Because Jones was unavailable at trial the detectives were permitted to recount his confession without mention of the defendant, as a declaration against penal interest. Toone, however, in testifying as to Jones' confession, made one reference to "the defendant", from which the jury could infer that Jones implicated Geoghegan. It is that statement by Jones which is the focus of this appeal.

In People v. Maerling, supra, at p. 298, 413 N.Y.S.2d 316, 385 N.E.2d 1245, we required that for a statement against penal interest to be admissible the interest compromised must be such as to "all but rule out" motive to falsify, the declarant must be conscious of the consequences of his statement at the time it is made, that only those parts which inculpate the declarant should be admitted, and that there should be an opportunity to show from the circumstances of its making that any indicia of apparent reliability are misleading. Those assurances of probative value, which might in a proper case substitute for cross-examination, were not present in this case. Additionally, the fact that Jones' confession was not restricted to self-inculpation, but as well implicated defendant, deprives it of admissibility under Maerling.

At the time Jones' confession was made he had already been arrested for the murder and was subject to criminal prosecution. Moreover, having seen Gilligan and Geoghegan in custody at the station house he believed the police to be already fully apprised of his own role in the crime. Thus, there was more than the "distinct possibility" we referred to in People v. Settles, 46 N.Y.2d 154, 168, 412 N.Y.S.2d 874, 385 N.E.2d 612, that he would be motivated to implicate falsely in hope of winning immunity to prosecution or a plea to a reduced charge. That achieving lenient treatment for himself was indeed Jones' goal is demonstrated by the degree of co-operation he gave the prosecution at various stages of the proceedings.

In his initial contact with the police Jones denied his own participation and misled the police. Only under stimulus of the belief that police already knew his role in the affair did Jones acknowledge a part in the crime, and then his "confession" carefully limited his participation to the less culpable role of waiting with Gilligan while, without their knowledge, others accomplished the actual killing. Jones then testified on his own behalf and against the others before the Grand Jury, and did not invoke his Fifth Amendment privilege until shortly before trial when it became clear that the prosecutor would afford him no consideration for his co-operation. That the particulars of Jones' recital of the facts may be said to mirror those to which Gilligan testified may not be remarkable either, inasmuch as Gilligan too might be expected to have been disposed to implicate defendant in exchange for acceptance of his plea to a charge of robbery.

In view of the seriousness of the charges facing him and the belief that his participation in the crime was already known, it is apparent that Jones had powerful incentives to minimize his own role and to place primary blame on others. We conclude therefore, as a matter of law, that Jones had motive to falsify, and that his declaration should not be admissible to prove the guilt of another.

The order of the Appellate Division should be affirmed.

JASEN, Judge (dissenting).

I would hold that the confession of one participant in a crime who refuses to testify at trial should be admitted in evidence as a declaration against penal interest where there exists a clear indication of the statement's reliability.

It is difficult to understand the majority's view that a statement or confession made by a participant in a crime revealing his involvement therein, such as that made by Jones in this case, is not admissible in evidence as a declaration against penal interest. I had thought such a statement or confession was admissible as an exception to the hearsay rule where the person making the admission is dead or beyond the jurisdiction and, thus, not available; or where he is available but refuses to testify in court on the ground of self incrimination. (E. g., People v. Maerling, 46 N.Y.2d 289, 295-299, 413 N.Y.S.2d 316, 385 N.E.2d 1245; People v. Brown, 26 N.Y.2d 88, 308 N.Y.S.2d 825, 257 N.E.2d 16.) As the court below aptly observed, "(Jones') statements were properly characterized as declarations against penal interest for they qualified as such under the fourfold test enunciated in People v. Settles (46 N.Y.2d 154, 167 (, 412 N.Y.S.2d 874, 385 N.E.2d 612)). First of all, (Jones) was unavailable because he refused to testify at defendant's trial. Secondly, he realized that the statements were against his penal interest when made. Thirdly, the declarant demonstrated a first-hand knowledge of the facts surrounding De Vroom's murder. Lastly, Gilligan's testimony constituted independent evidence confirming the reliability and trustworthiness of the declarations." (68 A.D.2d, at p. 283, 416 N.Y.S.2d, at p. 805; see, e. g., People v. Piazza, 48 N.Y.2d 151, 157, 422 N.Y.S.2d 9, 397 N.E.2d 700; People v. Maerling, 46 N.Y.2d 289, 295-299, 413 N.Y.S.2d 316, 385 N.E.2d 1245, supra; People v. Brown, 26 N.Y.2d 88, 308 N.Y.S.2d 825, 257 N.E.2d 16, supra ; see, generally, Richardson, Evidence (10th ed.), §§ 255-266.)

The majority, however, holds that Jones' station house confession is not admissible as a declaration against penal interest by suggesting that Jones may have bent the truth in a misguided attempt to save his own skin. I find such logic strained.

In the Maerling case, we stated "that the interest which the declaration compromises must be one of sufficient magnitude or consequence to the declarant to all but rule out any motive to falsify." (46 N.Y.2d 289, 298, 413 N.Y.S.2d 316, 321, 385 N.E.2d 1245, 1250, supra.) I simply cannot imagine a more compelling interest than the interest of a suspect in a brutal murder to conceal his involvement therein. It seems incredible that a man would confess fully to his participation in a murder in the farfetched hope of receiving lenient treatment, especially where, as here, the very persons whom he could implicate are already in the custody of law enforcement officials. If Jones "believed the police to be already fully apprised of his own role in the crime" (at p. 49, at p. 504 of 431 N.Y.S.2d, at p. 976 of 409 N.E.2d), it seems far more likely that Jones was prompted to confess because he believed that remaining silent would serve little purpose, rather than to confess in furtherance of an on-the-spot, contrived plan to escape prosecution for...