People v. Stover

• Citation: 115 N.Y.S.3d 500,178 A.D.3d 1138
• Decision Date: 05 December 2019
• Docket Number: 109688
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Raekwon STOVER, Appellant.
• Court: New York Supreme Court Appellate Division

178 A.D.3d 1138
115 N.Y.S.3d 500

The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent,
v.
Raekwon STOVER, Appellant.

109688

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

Calendar Date: October 18, 2019
Decided and Entered: December 5, 2019

Paul J. Connolly, Delmar, for appellant.

Robert M. Carney, District Attorney, Schenectady (Peter H. Willis of counsel), for respondent.

Before: Egan Jr., J.P., Lynch, Clark and Pritzker, JJ.

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

Pritzker, J.

178 A.D.3d 1138

On September 15, 2016, defendant, age 19, entered the home of the victim, age 17, and shot her in the head. An investigation revealed that defendant had been coordinating and profiting from the victim's activities as a prostitute and, in the month prior to her death, the victim had missed "dates," which caused arguments between defendant and the victim. After a week-long jury trial, defendant was convicted of one count of murder in the second degree (count 1), two counts of criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree (counts 3 and 4) and two counts of tampering with physical evidence (counts 5 and 6). After County Court denied defendant's motion pursuant to CPL 330.30, defendant was sentenced to a prison term of 25 years to life for his conviction of murder in the second degree, as well as lesser concurrent and consecutive prison terms for his other convictions. Defendant appeals, and we affirm.

178 A.D.3d 1139

Defendant argues that the jury verdict is not supported by legally sufficient evidence and is against the weight of the evidence.¹ "In conducting a legal sufficiency

115 N.Y.S.3d 504

analysis, this Court views the evidence in the light most favorable to the People and evaluates whether there is any valid line of reasoning and permissible inferences which could lead a rational person to the conclusion reached by the jury on the basis of the evidence at trial and as a matter of law satisfy the proof and burden requirement for every element of the crime charged" ( People v. Brousseau, 149 A.D.3d 1275, 1276, 52 N.Y.S.3d 534 [2017] [internal quotation marks, brackets and citations omitted]; see People v. Lamont, 25 N.Y.3d 315, 318, 12 N.Y.S.3d 6, 33 N.E.3d 1275 [2015] ). "A weight of the evidence review requires this Court to first determine whether, based on all the credible evidence, a different finding would not have been unreasonable. Where a different finding would not have been unreasonable, [this Court] must weigh the relative probative force of conflicting testimony and the relative strength of conflicting inferences that may be drawn from the testimony to determine if the verdict is supported by the weight of the evidence" ( People v. Taft, 145 A.D.3d 1090, 1091–1092, 41 N.Y.S.3d 794 [2016] [internal quotation marks, brackets and citations omitted], lv denied 29 N.Y.3d 953, 54 N.Y.S.3d 383, 76 N.E.3d 1086 [2017] ; see People v. Bleakley, 69 N.Y.2d 490, 495, 515 N.Y.S.2d 761, 508 N.E.2d 672 [1987] ; People v. Rizvi, 126 A.D.3d 1172, 1175, 5 N.Y.S.3d 596 [2015], lv denied 25 N.Y.3d 1076, 12 N.Y.S.3d 628, 34 N.E.3d 379 [2015] ).

As relevant here, a person is guilty of murder in the second degree when, "[w]ith intent to cause the death of another person, he [or she] causes the death of such person" ( Penal Law 125.25[1] ). A person is guilty of criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree when, "with intent to use the same unlawfully against another, such person ... possesses a loaded firearm" ( Penal Law § 265.03[1][b] ). A person is also guilty of criminal possession of a weapon when "such person ... possesses any loaded firearm" ( Penal Law § 265.03[3] ). "A person is guilty of tampering with physical evidence when, "[b]elieving that certain physical evidence is about to be produced or used in an official proceeding or a prospective official proceeding, and intending to prevent such production or use, he [or she] suppresses it by any act of concealment, alteration or destruction" ( Penal Law § 215.40[2] ).

178 A.D.3d 1140

The victim's mother (hereinafter the mother) testified to the events of the night that the victim was murdered. She explained that she was at her apartment when the victim came home between 10:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. and ate spaghetti before going to her room. While the mother was in bed, she heard a knock on the apartment door. She asked who was at the door and a voice responded by asking for the victim, at which time the mother called out to the victim to answer the door. The mother and the victim met in the hallway and the mother returned to her bedroom. The mother explained that she was in bed, "nodding off," when she heard a gunshot. The mother immediately went to the victim's bedroom and saw defendant standing over the victim.² The mother immediately left the bedroom, retrieved

115 N.Y.S.3d 505

her cell phone and called 911. While the mother was on the front porch speaking with 911, she saw defendant "busting out" of a nearby residence and running away. The mother testified that, in the two months preceding the incident, she had seen defendant at her house with the victim approximately five times. The mother's boyfriend testified that he was woken up from a deep sleep when the mother screamed, "They killed my baby." He explained that he went to the victim's bedroom and saw the victim lying on her back on a mattress in a pool of blood. He also stated that he believed the victim was "seeing" defendant because he had been at the house a couple of times. A next-door neighbor, who was friends with the victim, testified that, at approximately 11:00 p.m., she was at home asleep in her bedroom and that she woke up when she heard the victim scream for her mother and then heard a gunshot "less than a second" later. She explained that the victim's voice was loud and sounded scared.

Andrew Dannible, an officer with the City of Schenectady Police Department, testified that he was the first officer at the scene and that, when he went into the back bedroom in the apartment, he found the victim lying on the bed with a gunshot wound to her head. He testified that paramedics arrived at the scene shortly after and pronounced her dead. Christopher North, a detective and crime scene investigator with the City of Schenectady Police Department, testified that, after photographing the scene, he checked the area for physical evidence. North testified that he photographed, among other things, a bloody hand smear on the wall next to the victim's body and four live bullets found in the bedroom where the victim was located. North testified that, after the victim was removed from

178 A.D.3d 1141

the room, he found two cell phones underneath her body. William Martin, an investigator with the State Police, testified that he performed extractions on the two cell phones that revealed multiple conversations between the victim and defendant. Martin testified that several text messages contained in the victim's phone referenced prostitution, and that the Internet history revealed that the phone had been used to access a website called Backpage, which is used for prostitution. Martin also testified that several different email accounts associated with defendant were registered at Backpage. Michael Sikirica, a medical examiner, testified that he performed an autopsy of the victim and ultimately concluded that her cause of death was brain injuries due to a gunshot wound to the head. He further concluded, within a reasonable degree of medical certainty, that the manner of her death was homicide.

Several witnesses testified to events that occurred earlier in the evening of the victim's murder, including the victim's sister who testified that the victim was at her house at approximately 5:00 p.m. and that she was texting defendant. The sister's neighbor testified that he had met the victim prior to the night of her murder. He explained that the night of her murder he heard male and female voices outside of his apartment and that, when he looked to see who it was, he saw the victim arguing with a young, light-skinned male with braids in his hair. The sister's neighbor testified that he had seen him before with the victim. Clay Descesare testified that he used Backpage to meet up with girls for casual sexual encounters, and that he responded to an ad to meet up with a woman, whom he later learned was the victim, the night of her murder. However, after texting and calling the number associated with the victim to attempt to hire her as a prostitute, she never returned his messages or calls.

115 N.Y.S.3d 506

Abi Bashton, the mother of one of defendant's children, also testified at trial. Bashton testified that she lived down the street from the victim and that, on the night of the murder, she had been working and returned home around 10:40 p.m. Defendant was at her house when she arrived home and left "[t]o get bullets" approximately 10 to 15 minutes after she got home. Bashton stated that defendant did not come back to her house that evening and that, shortly after he left, she went up the street to the victim's...