People v. Sanders

• Decision Date: 22 December 1980
• Citation: 79 A.D.2d 688,433 N.Y.S.2d 854
• Parties: The PEOPLE, etc., Appellant, v. Willie SANDERS, Respondent.
• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division

Page 854

433 N.Y.S.2d 854

79 A.D.2d 688

The PEOPLE, etc., Appellant, v. Willie SANDERS, Respondent.

Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Second Department.

Dec. 22, 1980.

Eugene Gold, Dist. Atty., Brooklyn (Gary Maitland, Brooklyn, of counsel, Sally E. Unger on brief), for appellant.

William E. Hellerstein, New York City (Adrian Spratt, New York City, of counsel), for respondent.

Before MOLLEN, P. J., and LAZER, COHALAN and WEINSTEIN, JJ.

MEMORANDUM BY THE COURT.

Appeal by the People, as limited by their brief, from so much of an order of the Supreme Court, Kings County, entered March 20, 1980, as granted, after a hearing, the defendant's motion to suppress evidence. (We deem the notice of appeal filed by the People to be a premature notice of appeal from the aforesaid order.)

Order reversed insofar as appealed from, on the law, motion to suppress denied, and matter remitted to Criminal Term for further proceedings consistent herewith.

The defendant was indicted for criminal possession of a weapon in the third degree and criminal possession of a controlled substance in the eighth degree. He moved to suppress both the handgun and the heroin upon which the charges were based. He also sought to exclude evidence of a statement he had made following his arrest. At the pretrial suppression hearing, the People called the arresting officer, Calvin Flannagan, who testified that on Wednesday, July 11, 1979, at approximately 6 P.M., he was on patrol at the Pacific Street station of the BMT subway line in Brooklyn when he was approached by the defendant and a woman, later identified as Yvonne Jackson. The defendant asked for directions to Staten Island and, when the officer provided them, the defendant walked downstairs toward the northbound BMT platform. Ms. Jackson, however, remained behind and, after the defendant was out of sight, she said something to the officer. Immediately thereafter, the officer drew his weapon and hurried down the stairs in search of the defendant.

At the hearing, the Assistant District Attorney did not ask the officer to state what Ms. Jackson had told him. When, on cross-examination, defense counsel asked the officer whether he had gone downstairs "based upon" what Ms. Jackson had said, the prosecutor's objection was sustained.

When the officer went downstairs, he saw the defendant seated at one end of a bench seat in a train which was then standing with its doors open in the station. Although it was rush hour, the heavy traffic flow was in the other direction, and there were only some two or three other people in the defendant's car. None was seated close to him.

When the officer first saw him, the defendant was bending over with his left hand extended and was in the process of straightening up in his seat. As the officer came aboard the train, he saw a gun lying on the floor, approximately 12 inches from the defendant's left foot, at the spot from which the defendant appeared to be withdrawing his hand.

The officer immediately said, "don't move or else I'll shoot." He then placed the defendant under arrest, handcuffed him, and recovered the weapon from the floor. When the defendant asked what he was being arrested for, he was told that it was for the possession of the weapon. He replied by saying, "You're not going to put that on me. I've been around." This statement was made before the defendant had been advised of his constitutional rights.

Subsequently, as the defendant and Officer Flannagan were being driven to the precinct in a patrol car, the defendant began to squirm and fidget as if he were reaching for something in his back pocket. The officer thereupon seized the defendant's wallet, searched it, and discovered three tin foils containing a white powder which later proved to be heroin.

On this evidence, Criminal Term granted the defendant's motion to suppress in its entirety. The court refused to speculate as to what Ms. Jackson might have said to Officer Flannagan to prompt him to pursue the defendant. Indeed, the court later denied the People's request that the hearing be reopened so that such evidence could be placed on the record. Instead, the court assessed the proof as if Officer Flannagan had pursued and approached the defendant without any advance knowledge or information linking him to criminal conduct. In our view, the court did not err in so limiting its review.

The issue of probable cause might well have been conclusively and expeditiously resolved had the Assistant District Attorney timely recognized the relevance and admissibility of Yvonne Jackson's statement to the police. The record strongly suggests that Ms. Jackson had accused the defendant of criminal conduct and, as a general rule, information provided by an identified citizen accusing another individual of the commission of a specific crime is sufficient to provide the police with probable cause to arrest. (See, e. g., People v. Moore, 32 N.Y.2d 67, 71, 343 N.Y.S.2d 107, 295 N.E.2d 780 cert. den. 414 U.S. 1011, 94 S.Ct. 376, 38 L.Ed.2d 249; People v. Hyter, 61 A.D.2d 990, 991, 402 N.Y.S.2d 692; People v. Crespo, 70 A.D.2d 661, 417 N.Y.S.2d 19.) Thus, in the case at bar, Ms. Jackson's statement to Officer Flannagan was highly relevant to the crucial issue of probable cause. And the statement would have been admissible at the hearing even though reported in court by the officer rather than by Ms. Jackson herself.

In New York, hearsay is admissible at a pretrial suppression hearing to prove a material fact (see CPL 710.60, subd. 4). And, in any event, an officer's testimony as to an accusation made to him is not truly hearsay.

Although the truth of a citizen's accusation often becomes the central issue at a criminal trial, the same is not true at a pretrial suppression hearing. There, the issue is generally limited to whether the nature of the accusation, and the circumstantial indications of its reliability, were sufficient to justify the ensuing police conduct. (Cf. People v. Elwell, 50 N.Y.2d 231, 428 N.Y.S.2d 655, 406 N.E.2d 471; People v. West, 44 N.Y.2d 656, 405 N.Y.S.2d 29, 376 N.E.2d 190.) Hence, at a suppression hearing, a police officer's testimony as to an accusation made to him is not offered as evidence of the truth of the charge but only of the fact that it was made. Such testimony is not hearsay. (See Richardson, Evidence (Prince, 10th ed.), §§ 203, 204.)

In the case at bar, therefore, Officer Flannagan's testimony as to the information he received from Yvonne Jackson was admissible. Nevertheless, for reasons of his own, the prosecutor initially chose to withhold such evidence and, although he changed his position only one day after the proceeding concluded, we cannot say that the court abused its discretion in refusing to reopen the hearing after a decision had been rendered. (Cf. People v....