People v. Jones

• Decision Date: 16 December 2014
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Clifford JONES, Appellant.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

24 N.Y.3d 623

26 N.E.3d 754

2 N.Y.S.3d 815

2014 N.Y. Slip Op. 08760

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent

v.Clifford JONES, Appellant.

Court of Appeals of New York.

Dec. 16, 2014.

Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP, New York City (Heather K. Suchorsky, Breon S. Peace, Robert W. May, Michael W. Holt, Tania G. Cohen and Yana V. Grishkan of counsel), for appellant.

Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., District Attorney, New York City (David M. Cohn and Susan Axelrod of counsel), for respondent.

Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, New York City (Howard B. Comet, Melody E. Akhavan and Lisa Sokolowski of counsel), and Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP, Washington, D.C. (David B. Hird, Sunny Thompson and Courtney Enlow of counsel), for The Innocence Project, amicus curiae.

OPINION OF THE COURT

PIGOTT

, J.

Defendant sought an evidentiary hearing as part of his postjudgment motion to vacate his conviction on the ground that newly discovered evidence in the form of mitochondrial

DNA (mtDNA) testing excluded him as the perpetrator of crimes of which he was convicted in 1981 (see CPL 440.10[1][g]

). Supreme Court and the Appellate Division, in the exercise of their discretion, summarily denied defendant's motion. The jurisprudence of this Court, for nearly 40 years, has been that “[t]he power to review a discretionary order denying a motion to vacate judgment upon the ground of newly discovered evidence [brought pursuant to CPL 440.10(1)(g) ] ceases at the Appellate Division” (People v. Crimmins, 38 N.Y.2d 407, 409, 381 N.Y.S.2d 1, 343 N.E.2d 719 [1975] ), leaving this Court without the power to consider whether such summary denials constituted an abuse of discretion. Because the rule enunciated in Crimmins has needlessly restricted this Court's power of review concerning CPL 440.10(1)(g) motions, we now overrule that part of the Crimmins decision, hold that the Appellate Division abused its discretion in summarily denying defendant's motion for an evidentiary hearing in this case, and remand it to Supreme Court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

I

Newly discovered evidence is one of the bases under CPL 440.10(1)

that defendants may allege when seeking postjudgment relief (see CPL 440.10[1] [a]-[i] ). When it became law in 1971, CPL 440.10 was designed to replace the common-law contentions previously raised through a motion for a writ of error coram nobis and post-conviction applications for a new trial based on newly discovered evidence (see Richard G. Denzer, Practice Commentary, McKinney's Cons. Laws of N.Y., Book 11A, CPL 440.10 at 183 [1971 ed]; see also

Peter Preiser, Practice Commentaries, McKinney's Cons. Laws of N.Y., Book 11A, CPL 440.10

at 248 [stating that “resort to coram nobis is unavailable in situations covered by the statute”] ). Prior to the statute's enactment, however, this Court declined to review postjudgment arguments that the Appellate Division abused its discretion in denying a defendant's motion for a new trial based on newly discovered evidence, holding that “[t]he right to a review of such an order [in a noncapital case] ceases at the Appellate Division” (People v. Fein, 18 N.Y.2d 162, 169, 272 N.Y.S.2d 753, 219 N.E.2d 274 [1966], cert. denied 385 U.S. 649, 87 S.Ct. 766, 17 L.Ed.2d 668 [1967], reh. denied 386 U.S. 978, 87 S.Ct. 1157, 18 L.Ed.2d 140 [1967] [citations omitted]; see

People v. Mistretta, 7 N.Y.2d 843, 844, 196 N.Y.S.2d 715, 164 N.E.2d 730 [1959] ; People v. Girardi, 303 N.Y. 887, 105 N.E.2d 109 [1952] ; People v. Luciano, 275 N.Y. 547, 548, 11 N.E.2d 747 [1937], cert. denied 305 U.S. 620 [1938] [striking from the record all proceedings upon the motion for a new trial based on newly discovered evidence on the ground that this Court lacked

the power to review the discretionary order in noncapital cases]; People v. Bonifacio, 190 N.Y. 150, 151–152, 82 N.E. 1098 [1907]

). Indeed, before the enactment of CPL article 440, no statute provided for an appeal to this Court in postjudgment proceedings.

In Crimmins, we relied on those pre–1971 cases as the foundation for our “hands-off” approach with respect to newly discovered evidence claims, and imposed a limitation on our power of review, holding that we could not review the lower courts' summary denial of a defendant's motion to vacate based on newly discovered evidence (Crimmins, 38 N.Y.2d at 415–416, 381 N.Y.S.2d 1, 343 N.E.2d 719

). However, CPL 440.10 was not a piecemeal amendment to the Criminal Procedure Law but, rather, was part of the newly-adopted Criminal Procedure Law (L. 1970, ch. 996), which “overhauled and reformulated” the “whole area of appeals” (Mem. in Support and Explanation of Proposed Crim. Pro. Law, L. 1970, ch. 996 at 12).¹ At the time this Court decided Crimmins, the new Criminal Procedure Law provided defendants not only a mechanism for appealing a denial of a CPL 440.10 motion to the Appellate Division (see CPL 450.15[1] ), but also an opportunity to seek leave to appeal to this Court “from any adverse or partially adverse order of an intermediate appellate court entered upon an appeal taken to such intermediate appellate court pursuant to section ... 450.15” (CPL 450.90[1] ).

The Crimmins majority acknowledged that CPL 450.15(1)

and CPL 450.90(1) made the denial of a CPL 440.10(1)(g) motion appealable, but submitted that merely because the denial of a motion was appealable it did not follow that it was also reviewable, explaining that this Court's review power could not be expanded by statute alone and that CPL 450.90(1) “must be read in context of constitutional limitations,” i.e., N.Y. Constitution, article VI, § 3 (a) (Crimmins, 38 N.Y.2d at 414–415, 381 N.Y.S.2d 1, 343 N.E.2d 719 ). That constitutional provision limits this Court's jurisdiction, as relevant here, to “the review of questions of law except where the judgment is of death.” (N.Y. Const., art. VI, § 3

[a].) As far as jurisdictional rules go, the Crimmins majority was correct: although an order may be appealable to this Court, it may nonetheless

not present a reviewable question of law (see William C. Donnino, New York Court of Appeals on Criminal Law § 3.1 at 41 [3d ed. 2011] ).

We part company with the Crimmins majority not with regard to its general analysis of this Court's jurisdiction, but with respect to its postulation that because lower courts have “unlimited” discretion in deciding whether a defendant is entitled to vacatur of judgment and a new trial based on newly discovered evidence, their determination is somehow beyond reproach (Crimmins, 38 N.Y.2d at 415, 381 N.Y.S.2d 1, 343 N.E.2d 719

). In reaching that conclusion, the Crimmins majority relied on pre-CPL 440.10 cases such as Fein,

Mistretta, Girardi, Luciano and Bonifacio, decided at a time when defendants had no statutory mechanism by which to appeal to this Court from a denial of an application for a new trial based on newly discovered evidence (see e.g.

People v. Baxter, 40 A.D.2d 551, 551, 334 N.Y.S.2d 57 [2d Dept.1972] [dismissing the defendant's appeal challenging Supreme Court's denial of his motion for a new trial based on newly discovered evidence brought pursuant to section 465(7) of the Code of Criminal Procedure] ).

Now that such mechanisms are in place, defendants whose newly discovered evidence motions are summarily denied by the lower courts should have the opportunity, within the strictures of CPL 450.90(1)

, to have those determinations reviewed under our abuse of discretion standard, which involves a legal, rather than factual, review. As the Crimmins dissent acknowledged,

“whether there has been an abuse of discretion is a question of law, not of fact. It matters not that the discretion which we review necessarily was exercised in a factual setting. And that is so even though we must look at the facts in order to determine whether the discretion was indeed abused” (Crimmins, 38 N.Y.2d at 428, 381 N.Y.S.2d 1, 343 N.E.2d 719

[Fuchsberg, J., dissenting]; see also e.g.

Barasch v. Micucci, 49 N.Y.2d 594, 598, 427 N.Y.S.2d 732, 404 N.E.2d 1275 [1980] [“the possibility that the lower court's discretion was abused does give rise to a question of law that is cognizable in this court”] ).

Significant to our analysis is the structure of CPL 440.10(1)

itself and the standard of review we have employed under distinct provisions of that subdivision. We have exercised our power of review in the following instances: where the defendant challenges the lower courts' denial of his CPL 440.10 motion seeking a hearing on his claim that the judgment was procured

by fraud, duress or misrepresentation (see CPL 440.10[1] [b]

; People v. Friedgood, 58 N.Y.2d 467, 470, 462 N.Y.S.2d 406, 448 N.E.2d 1317 [1983] ); where the defendant seeks a hearing claiming that material evidence adduced at trial resulting in the judgment was false (see CPL 440.10[1][c] ; People v. Brown, 56 N.Y.2d 242, 246, 451 N.Y.S.2d 693, 436 N.E.2d 1295 [1982], rearg. denied 57 N.Y.2d 673, 454 N.Y.S.2d 1032, 439 N.E.2d 1247 [1982] ); where the defendant claims that improper and prejudicial conduct occurred off the record during the trial (see CPL 440.10[1][f] ; Crimmins, 38 N.Y.2d at 418, 381 N.Y.S.2d 1, 343 N.E.2d 719 ); and where the defendant challenges a judgment on the ground that it was obtained in violation of defendant's state or federal constitutional rights (see CPL 440.10[1] [h] ; People v. Baxley, 84 N.Y.2d 208, 212–213, 616 N.Y.S.2d 7, 639 N.E.2d 746 [1994]

, rearg. dismissed 86 N.Y.2d 886, 635 N.Y.S.2d 952, 659 N.E.2d 775 [1995] ).

In each of those cases, this Court held that it could review the lower courts' summary denial of a defendant's motion pursuant to CPL 440.10(1)(b), (c), (f) or (h)

by applying the abuse of discretion standard, presumably because such motions were subject to postjudgment judicial review by way of a writ of error coram nobis before CPL 440.10's enactment (see e.g.

Baxley, 84 N.Y.2d at 212–213, 616 N.Y.S.2d 7, 639 N.E.2d 746 ; Crimmins, 38 N.Y.2d at 418–419, 381 N.Y.S.2d 1, 343 N.E.2d...