People v. Jackson

• Decision Date: 04 April 1996
• Citation: 642 N.Y.S.2d 602,665 N.E.2d 172,87 N.Y.2d 782
• Parties: , 665 N.E.2d 172 The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Thomas JACKSON, Respondent.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

Page 602

642 N.Y.S.2d 602

87 N.Y.2d 782, 665 N.E.2d 172

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Thomas JACKSON, Respondent.

Court of Appeals of New York.

April 4, 1996.

Charles J. Hynes, District Attorney of Kings County, Brooklyn (Leonard Joblove and Roseann B. MacKechnie, of counsel), for appellant.

Sally Wasserman, New York City, for respondent.

OPINION OF THE COURT

KAYE, Chief Judge.

When a trial court reduces an indictment to a lesser count on the basis of legally insufficient evidence, CPL 210.20(6)--which stays the effectiveness of the reduction order for 30 days--gives the People the following three options: (a) accept the court's order and file the reduced indictment, (b) resubmit the higher count to the same or a different Grand Jury or (c) challenge the propriety of the reduction by appealing the order to a higher court.

This case calls upon us to address two questions resulting from what the trial court accurately described as a "vacuum" in the statute (People v. Jackson, 154 Misc.2d 769, 776, 588 N.Y.S.2d 88). Specifically, we must first decide what happens when the People fail to exercise any of the three options within 30 days. Must the court dismiss all charges pending against the defendant, or may the People proceed against the defendant on the reduced count? A second, related question is whether the People are precluded from resubmitting the higher count after 30 days have passed without first seeking permission of the court upon a showing of good cause. Not surprisingly, variations on both these questions have divided the trial courts (compare, People v. Jackson, supra; and People v. Powell, 148 Misc.2d 966, 564 N.Y.S.2d 663, with People v. Ferguson, 159 Misc.2d 51, 602 N.Y.S.2d 785; People v. Nunez, 157 Misc.2d 793, 598 N.Y.S.2d 917; and People v. Gega, 151 Misc.2d 70, 580 N.Y.S.2d 639).

We agree with the People that neither the language nor the structure of CPL 210.20 contemplates dismissal of the reduced count as a result of the District Attorney's failure to act within 30 days, and therefore answer the first question in the negative; the prosecution can proceed on the reduced count. Our answer to the second question, however, is in the affirmative: the statute requires the People either to resubmit the higher count within 30 days of the reduction order or, upon a showing of good cause, to seek leave of court for an extension of time in which to do so.

In that the People here failed either to resubmit the higher count within 30 days or to show good cause for their delay, the only charge that remained viable after the expiration of the stay was the reduced count. While the People might have proceeded on the reduced count, the defendant has by now already served more than the maximum permissible sentence for that crime, and we therefore affirm the order of the Appellate Division dismissing the indictment.

The relevant facts are undisputed. On March 7, 1991, a Kings County Grand Jury indicted defendant of one count of Penal Law § 265.02(4) (criminal possession of a weapon in the third degree) which makes it a crime to possess any loaded firearm in a place other than one's home or business. On June 7, 1991, upon defendant's motion to inspect the Grand Jury minutes and reduce the indictment (CPL 210.30), the trial court ordered the indictment reduced to criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree, a lesser included offense, on the ground that the People failed to establish that the location where defendant was observed with the firearm was not his home or business (see, People v. Menchetti, 76 N.Y.2d 473, 478, 560 N.Y.S.2d 760, 561 N.E.2d 536). The court then directed the People to proceed pursuant to CPL 210.20(6) and adjourned the case to allow the People to exercise one of the three statutory options during the next 30 days.

When the case reconvened 31 days later, on July 8, 1991, the People acknowledged that they had taken no action pursuant to CPL 210.20(6). Assuming that the case would proceed on the reduced indictment the trial court granted the People's request for a one-month adjournment. ¹

In the meantime, the People resubmitted the case and succeeded in obtaining a new indictment charging defendant with the more serious crime of attempted criminal possession of a weapon in the third degree. Defendant eventually pleaded guilty in satisfaction of the later indictment.

Defendant then moved to withdraw his plea on the ground that the People's re-presentment of attempted criminal possession of a weapon in the third degree more than 30 days after the original indictment had been reduced divested the Grand Jury of jurisdiction. Focusing solely on the question whether the People properly submitted the more serious count a second time, the trial court denied the motion, reading CPL 210.20(6) as imposing no temporal limitation on the People's authority to resubmit (154 Misc.2d 769, 588 N.Y.S.2d 88, supra ).

Relying on its previous decision in People v. Rios, 203 A.D.2d 491, 610 N.Y.S.2d 871, the Appellate Division disagreed, concluding that CPL 210.20(6) required the People to obtain the explicit permission of the trial court in order to re-present more than 30 days after the reduction order (212 A.D.2d 732, 622 N.Y.S.2d 808). Noting that defendant had already served more than the maximum sentence permissible upon conviction for the offense of criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree, the Appellate Division did not address in any detail the reasons why CPL 210.20 would not have precluded resumption of the prosecution on the reduced indictment--as we now do.

CPL 210.20, entitled "Motion to dismiss or reduce indictment," provides the procedural mechanism for pretrial challenges to defects, procedural and substantive, in Grand Jury proceedings leading to an indictment. Prior to the passage of the recent amendments to CPL 210.20 at issue here, Trial Judges were powerless to reduce counts in indictments based on evidentiary insufficiency (see, People v. Cruz, 84 A.D.2d 962, 446 N.Y.S.2d 721). Instead, the former statute permitted only outright dismissal on that basis. Yet because courts were required to sustain indictments when the evidence before the Grand Jury was sufficient to establish the offense charged or any lesser included offense, it was not uncommon for defendants to stand trial on and ultimately be convicted of crimes for which there had not been sufficient evidence before the Grand Jury (see, Preiser, Practice Commentaries, McKinney's Cons Laws of N.Y., Book 11A, CPL 210.20 at 598).

In fact, a Trial Judge's inability under the former statute to reduce an indictment based on the evidentiary realities of the case at times had the effect of disadvantaging defendants in plea negotiations by giving prosecutors unfair bargaining power (see, 1990 Report of Advisory Comm on Criminal Law and Procedure, reprinted in 1990 McKinney's Session Laws of N.Y. at 2860). Additionally, an "overcharged" indictment artificially inflated the number of peremptory challenges available to each side. These and other deficiencies in the former statute had the effect of significantly delaying the final resolution of criminal cases (id.).

Responding to these problems, the Legislature in 1990 amended the statute to expressly authorize trial courts to reduce counts when appropriate. Thus, subdivision (1-a) of the statute now provides that if a court "finds that the evidence before the grand jury was not legally sufficient to establish the commission by the defendant of the offense charged in any count contained within the indictment," it shall order the count reduced to "the most serious lesser included offense with respect to which the evidence before the grand jury was sufficient" (CPL 210.20[1-a]. According to a State Executive Department memorandum in support of the 1990 amendment, "[p]ermitting judges to reduce counts of indictments that are not supported by grand jury evidence will provide a judge with flexibility to do justice when the grand jury evidence does not support an offense charged but does support a lesser included offense" (Mem. of State Executive Dept. 1990 McKinney's Session Laws of N.Y. at 2381, 2383). Recognizing, however, the possibility that a defendant might be tempted to exercise the statutory right to plead guilty to the reduced indictment before the People had a fair chance to respond (see, CPL 220.60), newly added subdivision (6) further provides that "[t]he effectiveness of an order reducing a count or counts of an indictment * * * shall be stayed for thirty days following the entry of such order unless such stay is otherwise waived by the people" (CPL 210.20[6]. Designed to deter misuse of reduction orders by defendants, this automatic 30-day stay keeps the scales from tipping too far the other way by protecting the People's prerogatives both in making appropriate charging decisions and in conducting plea negotiations (see, 1990 Report of Advisory Comm. on Criminal Law and Procedure, reprinted in 1990 McKinney's Session Laws of N.Y. at 2860).

Thus, on or before the conclusion of the 30-day period, the statute authorizes the People to exercise one of the following three options:

"(a) Accept the court's order by filing a reduced indictment * * *;

"(b) Resubmit the subject count or counts to the same or a different grand jury within thirty days of the entry of the order or such additional time as the court may permit upon a showing of good cause; * * * [or]

"(c) Appeal the order pursuant to subdivision one-a of section 450.20" (CPL 210.20[6][a]-[c].

Turning to resolution of the first question presented--whether the People's failure to exercise any of these three options before the expiration of the 30-day stay requires a dismissal on the merits--the common understanding of the term "stay" as merely a temporary suspension in the normal course of proceedings which are to resume once the stay is lifted persuades us that a...