People v. Sidberry

• Decision Date: 13 March 2018
• Docket Number: 5957,Ind. 3239N/12,5956
• Citation: 159 A.D.3d 486,72 N.Y.S.3d 65
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Yuseiph SIDBERRY, Defendant–Appellant.
• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division

159 A.D.3d 486

72 N.Y.S.3d 65

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent,

v.Yuseiph SIDBERRY, Defendant–Appellant.

5956

5957

Ind. 3239N/12

Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Department, New York.

ENTERED: MARCH 13, 2018

Robert S. Dean, Center for Appellate Litigation, New York (Mark W. Zeno of counsel), for appellant.

Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., District Attorney, New York (Sheila O'Shea of counsel), for respondent.

Friedman, J.P., Andrias, Singh, Moulton, JJ.

Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Melissa C. Jackson, J.), rendered October 31, 2013, as amended August 18, 2016, convicting defendant, after a jury trial, of criminal sale of a controlled substance in the third degree, and sentencing him, as a second felony drug offender, to a term of 10 years, unanimously modified, as a matter of discretion in the interest of justice, to the extent of reducing the sentence to a term of 8 years, and otherwise affirmed.

Defendant's ineffective assistance of counsel claims are unreviewable on direct appeal because they involve matters not reflected in, or fully explained by, the record, including, among other things, counsel's strategy, analysis and pretrial preparations (seePeople v. Rivera,71 N.Y.2d 705, 709, 530 N.Y.S.2d 52, 525 N.E.2d 698[1988];People v. Love,57 N.Y.2d 998, 457 N.Y.S.2d 238, 443 N.E.2d 486[1982] ).Accordingly, since defendant has not made a CPL 440.10 motion, the merits of the ineffectiveness claims may not be addressed on appeal.In the alternative, to the extent the existing record permits review, we find that defendant received effective assistance under the state and federal standards (seePeople v. Benevento,91 N.Y.2d 708, 713–714, 674 N.Y.S.2d 629, 697 N.E.2d 584[1998];Strickland v. Washington,466 U.S. 668, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674[1984] ).The record does not establish defendant's claim that his counsel misunderstood or mishandled defendant's specific agency defense, which was that he acted as both an agent and as a buyer in his own right (seePeople v. Andujas,79 N.Y.2d 113, 580 N.Y.S.2d 719, 588 N.E.2d 754[1992] ).In any event, defendant has not shown that any of counsel's alleged deficiencies fell below an objective standard of reasonableness, or that, viewed individually or collectively, they deprived defendant of a fair trial or affected the outcome of the case.

The court providently exercised its discretion in permitting the People to refute defendant's agency defense by eliciting his prior convictions relating to the sale of drugs, including their underlying facts (seePeople v. Valentin,29 N.Y.3d 150, 156, 53 N.Y.S.3d 592, 75 N.E.3d 1153[2017] ).The probative value of this evidence outweighed the potential for undue prejudice, which the court minimized by means of...