People v. Gruden

• Decision Date: 07 July 1977
• Citation: 42 N.Y.2d 214,397 N.Y.S.2d 704
• Parties: , 366 N.E.2d 794 The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Joseph GRUDEN, Respondent. The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Donald FRAZIER, Respondent.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

Page 704

397 N.Y.S.2d 704

42 N.Y.2d 214, 366 N.E.2d 794

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Joseph GRUDEN, Respondent.

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Donald FRAZIER, Respondent.

Court of Appeals of New York.

July 7, 1977.

Carl A. Vergari, Dist. Atty. (Janet E. Cunard, White Plains, of counsel), for appellant.

Irving Nitzberg, Tarrytown, for Joseph Gruden, respondent.

Robert W. Stieve and Stephen J. Pittari, White Plains, for Donald Frazier, respondent.

WACHTLER, Judge.

In each of these cases the defendants moved to dismiss the indictment on speedy trial grounds, claiming that the People were not ready for trial within six months of the commencement of the criminal action (C.P.L. 30.30, subd. 1, par. (a)). The People did not dispute the facts alleged in the defendants' motion papers. Instead they consented to a hearing.

C.P.L. 210.45 (subd. 4, par. (c)) provides that "The court must grant the motion without conducting a hearing if * * * (t)he sworn allegations of fact essential to support the motion are either conceded by the people to be true or are conclusively substantiated by unquestionable documentary proof." The trial court dismissed the indictments without a hearing holding that "the failure of the People to raise an issue of fact in their answering papers is tantamount to a concession on their part as to the truth of the allegations of the moving papers."

On this appeal the People claim that the court erred in dismissing the indictments without a hearing because the People had not expressly conceded the facts alleged by the defendants. They have also informed us that it is, or was, the accepted practice in Westchester County for the court to conduct a hearing under these circumstances.

It is fundamental that a motion may be decided without a hearing unless the papers submitted raise a factual dispute on a material point which must be resolved before the court can decide the legal issue (see, e.g., C.P.L.R. 2218). Nevertheless the People conclude that C.P.L. 210.45 (subd. 4) establishes a new and unusual procedure. In their view the statute should be literally read so as to preclude the court from summarily granting the motion to dismiss unless the facts are expressly conceded by the People to be true, arguing that a failure on the part of the People to controvert is not necessarily to be deemed a concession under the statute. They surmise that this unusual procedure may be occasioned by the fact that to grant the motion would be to abort the prosecution at the threshold.

It should be noted that this statutory procedure is not peculiar to motions to dismiss. The same standard applies in those sections dealing with motions to suppress (C.P.L. 710.60, subd. 2, par. (b)), motions to set aside a verdict (C.P.L. 330.40, subd. 2, par. (d)) and motions to vacate a judgment or set aside a sentence (C.P.L. 440.30, subd. 3, par. (c)). In short it is the standard procedure to be followed in connection with nearly every pretrial and posttrial motion made in a criminal action.

The prosecution's "literal" interpretation of the statutory language could have a catastrophic effect on motion practice in all criminal cases. The court's power to grant motions on the papers will be virtually abolished. Even though the facts alleged warrant the relief sought, even though there is no factual dispute presented in the papers, and even though the prosecutor's case may be hopelessly lost, the court must hold a hearing before granting the motion if the prosecutor decides that he will not expressly concede the facts alleged. No statute should be interpreted that literally.

Obviously it is not the statutory language but the prosecution's interpretation of it which is unusual. Normally what is not disputed is deemed to be conceded. Generally a party opposing a motion cannot arbitrarily demand a hearing to conduct a fishing expedition. The courts should not assume that the Legislature intended to establish such a useless and wasteful procedure.

There is a special irony in the position taken by the prosecution in this case. Several years ago in People v. Ganci, 27 N.Y.2d 418, 318 N.Y.S.2d 484, 267 N.E.2d 263, a speedy trial case, this court undertook an extended statistical analysis of court congestion and concluded that hearings "consume substantial amounts of time and contribute to the delays in processing criminal cases" (People v. Ganci, supra, p. 426, 318 N.Y.S.2d p. 490, 267 N.E.2d p. 268). We noted that the problem was of such magnitude that drastic measures should be adopted to cut back on the amount of time consumed by these collateral proceedings. In fact it was suggested that "in view of the growing crisis caused by congested criminal calendars, reduplicat hearings before the Judge, and then before the Judge and the jury, on similar proof, is a procedural luxury" which should be abolished (People v. Ganci, supra at p. 425, 318 N.Y.S.2d at p. 489, 267 N.E.2d at p. 267).

Following Ganci, the Administrative Board of the Judicial Conference promulgated a series of rules, to become effective May 1, 1972, providing specific time-period definitions of a speedy trial (Rules, Administrative Board of Judicial Council, §§ 29.1-29.27; 22 N.Y.C.R.R. 29.1-29.7). These rules were almost absolute in nature. As long...