People v. Rojas

• Decision Date: 25 October 2001
• Citation: 735 N.Y.S.2d 470,760 N.E.2d 1265,97 N.Y.2d 32
• Parties: THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, Respondent, v. ENRIQUE ROJAS, Appellant.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

97 N.Y.2d 32

760 N.E.2d 1265

735 N.Y.S.2d 470

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, Respondent, v. ENRIQUE ROJAS, Appellant.

Court of Appeals of the State of New York.

Argued September 12, 2001.

Decided October 25, 2001.

Hiscock Legal Aid Society, Syracuse (Philip Rothschild of counsel), for appellant.

William J. Fitzpatrick, District Attorney of Onondaga County, Syracuse (Mark Moody and James P. Maxwell of counsel), for respondent.

Chief Judge KAYE and Judges LEVINE, CIPARICK, WESLEY and GRAFFEO concur with Judge ROSENBLATT; Judge SMITH dissents in a separate opinion.

OPINION OF THE COURT

ROSENBLATT, J.

Defendant contends that the trial court committed reversible error by allowing the prosecution to introduce evidence of a prior alleged crime. He relies on People v Molineux (168 NY 264 [1901]), which prohibits the introduction of such evidence unless it falls within a limited number of exceptions to its rule. We conclude, however, that because defendant opened the door to this proof based on the combination of his opening statement and cross-examination of a prosecution witness, the court properly admitted the challenged proof.

While in custody in the Onondaga Justice Center jail, defendant allegedly attempted to assault another inmate. Jail personnel considered defendant to be dangerous, and reassigned him to segregated custody in the jail's "behavioral unit." To reduce the threat of injury to inmates and others, jail policy prohibited inmates in this unit from wearing fabric clothing, and instead required them to wear paper clothes. After defendant initially refused to trade his fabric pants for paper ones, several guards entered his cell to supervise his exchange of clothing. Defendant punched one of the guards in the face, dislocating his jaw. A grand jury indicted defendant for the assault on the guard and the prior attempted assault on the inmate. County Court granted defendant's motion to sever the charges and try the assault on the guard first. That case is now before us.

During pre-trial proceedings, the defense moved to preclude the prosecution from introducing proof of defendant's alleged attempted assault on the inmate, arguing that such proof constituted inadmissible propensity evidence. In response, the People asserted that some explanation of defendant's segregated status and paper clothes was necessary to avoid giving jurors the impression that jail guards were mistreating him. The court ordered the prosecutor not to discuss defendant's alleged attempted assault on the inmate, and ruled that his paper clothes could be explained by telling jurors that guards were "changing [defendant's] status from within the jail[,] and that status required a change of clothing to color coordinate his status." The court further ruled that it would allow the People to explore the paper clothing issue "to some degree," but would stop short of permitting evidence that defendant was a "trouble maker."

In its opening statement, the defense did not deny striking the guard. Instead, it concentrated on the hardships of segregated detention, which defense counsel called "punitive segregation" and the "box." Defense counsel continued that defendant's "basic needs were met sometimes"; that he could not take a daily bath; that he was "afraid" and "depressed"; that he felt "threatened"; and that he felt his "life was over." Defense counsel portrayed defendant as sitting on his bed when suddenly his cell door opened, five guards surrounded him and a scuffle broke out. Defense counsel described how jail deputies "restrained" defendant, and that when they strapped his legs and arms to a chair, "he wondered if he had done something wrong." The defense narrated how defendant was bewildered by having to "wear paper again," and how he felt he "didn't do anything wrong" to deserve such treatment. Defendant's attorney concluded by imploring jurors to find that "the jailers had a duty to do what was right," and that the charge against defendant was "unfair" in light of the conditions he endured in jail.

The People's first witness was Deputy Keith Betsey, a jail officer who supervised defendant on the day of the alleged crime. Betsey testified that defendant had been made to wear paper clothes for defendant's own safety. On cross-examination, the defense elicited testimony that guards had held defendant in isolation in the "box," where he had limited recreation, wore paper pants, and was not allowed access to pens, pencils or sheets. The People's second witness, Sergeant Walter Rys, testified that, as a floor supervisor in defendant's cell block, he had come to know defendant because "he was a problem downstairs." The court overruled defendant's objection to this testimony, noting that the defense had "opened the door" in its opening statement and by eliciting details from Deputy Betsey about the harsh conditions in the "box." Rys continued his answer, explaining that defendant was in "an altercation with another inmate," whom defendant stabbed with a pencil. When defense counsel objected again, the court instructed the jury that it was important for them to understand why defendant was held in segregated custody, but that they should not "in any way consider why [defendant] was [in segregated custody] as any evidence of his guilt as to these specific charges." The court told the jury that the "purpose of this testimony [was] to give you a reason why [defendant was in segregated custody], because I think counsel has opened the door for that explanation."

At a later recess, defendant moved for a mistrial, arguing that, in violation of the court's initial Molineux ruling, the People's witnesses had improperly mentioned defendant's prior attempted assault on the inmate. The court denied the motion, finding that defense counsel had misled jurors by portraying defendant as a victim of unjust treatment in jail, and that any resulting prejudice was self-created. In its final charge, the court again admonished the jury not to consider any evidence of defendant's prior crimes as proof of guilt, and not to consider any "testimony about certain behavior of defendant while in the custody of the Justice Center" as bearing on the crime charged. The jury convicted defendant of two counts of assault in the second degree for having struck the jail guard.

After the Appellate Division unanimously affirmed the conviction, a Judge of this Court granted defendant leave to appeal. We now affirm.

Defendant contends that evidence of the prior attempted assault does not fall within any of the Molineux exceptions and, therefore, its introduction deprived him of a fair trial. Defendant ignores the fact that he initially benefitted from a favorable ruling barring introduction of the prior alleged stabbing, and then sought to utilize that ruling as a sword, to his advantage, by mischaracterizing the purpose of his solitary confinement.

Molineux, which this Court decided on October 15, 1901, is now 100 years old. The last century has added to Molineux certain refinements and procedures, but its foundation remains unchanged: a criminal case should be tried on the facts and not on the basis of a defendant's propensity to commit the crime charged. It is axiomatic that propensity evidence invites a jury to misfocus, if not base its verdict, on a defendant's prior crimes rather than on the evidence—or lack of evidence—relating to the case before it. We have repeated this theme throughout the last century.¹ Indeed, courts recognized it long before Molineux.²

Despite its age, the Molineux rule has never become calcified or brittle—its progeny have seen to that. Although many cases have fallen within the five general Molineux exceptions under which prior-crime evidence may be admitted,³ we have made it clear, as the prosecution correctly points out, that the list is merely illustrative and not exhaustive (see, People v Alvino, 71 NY2d 233, 241 [1987]

; People v Vails, 43 NY2d 364, 368 [1977]).⁴

However flexible or incomplete these categories may be, the cases have generally involved the introduction of prior crimes or bad acts as probative of a defendant's guilt. As the trial court recognized in its initial ruling, the character of the proof as probative of guilt was not convincing. Its probative nature, however, became more compelling—and arguably admissible under Molineux—when introduced to justify defendant's confinement and the guards' actions. In this light, the challenged proof served to support the charge that defendant assaulted the guard while preventing him from performing a lawful duty. It thus refuted the defense's contention that while undeservedly confined, defendant was the victim of unjustified if not unlawful restraint by the guards. Indeed, we have recognized that the prosecution, even when it did not initially seek to introduce such proof, may introduce evidence of prior crimes to refute defendants' contentions at trial (see, Alvino, 71 NY2d, at 246,

supra; People v Ingram, 71 NY2d 474, 479-480 [1988]; People v Hernandez, 71 NY2d 233, 246 [1987]; Santarelli, 49 NY2d, at 248, supra).

We conclude, however, that because defendant abused the initial favorable Molineux ruling, it is not necessary for us, in this unique factual setting, to engage in needless classification by pressing the outer limits of Molineux or creating a "door opener" exception to its rule. Although the parties have cast this appeal in terms of whether the challenged evidence is admissible under a Molineux exception, we have never held—nor is it the law—that evidence of a prior crime or bad act is admissible only if it passes through the Molineux prism. Indeed, a jury may consider defendant's prior crimes as bearing on credibility, and trial courts have discretion to allow prosecutors to cross-examine defendants as to prior crimes (People v Sandoval, 34 NY2d 371, 376 [1974]). Moreover, CPL 60.40 (1) authorizes the prosecution to prove a defendant's prior...