State v. Cummings
| Docket Number | A-0532-20 |
| Decision Date | 24 July 2023 |
| Parties | STATE OF NEW JERSEY, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. ANDREA CUMMINGS, a/k/a CHERIANNE SIMMONS, ANGELA SIMMON, ANDREA R CUMMINGS, ANGELA CUMMINGS, ANGIE CUMMINGS, ANGELA C SIMMONS, ANGELINA CUMMINGS, ANGIE R. CUMMINGS, ANGELA DAVIS, MONIQUE HARDEN, CONNIE HORSEY, and AMY BRADY, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | New Jersey Superior Court — Appellate Division |
This opinion shall not "constitute precedent or be binding upon any court." Although it is posted on the internet this opinion is binding only on the parties in the case and its use in other cases is limited. R. 1:36-3.
Submitted April 26, 2023
On appeal from the Superior Court of New Jersey, Law Division Somerset County, Indictment No. 19100584.
Joseph E. Krakora, Public Defender, attorney for appellant (Simon Wiener, Assistant Deputy Public Defender, of counsel and on the brief).
John P. McDonald, Somerset County Prosecutor, attorney for respondent (Paul H. Heinzel, Assistant Prosecutor, of counsel and on the brief).
Before Judges Currier and Bishop-Thompson.
Defendant appeals from her convictions following a jury trial. She alleges the court erred in admitting certain evidence and in denying her motion for acquittal, and there was prosecutorial misconduct in the State's closing argument. We affirm.
We derive the facts from the evidence presented at trial. On August 18, 2019, South Bound Brook police officer Ryan Carideo pulled over a vehicle after he observed a traffic violation. He recognized the vehicle because he had "pulled it over six days prior." The driver on this date, identified later as defendant, was a black woman.
The police vehicle was equipped with a "motor vehicle recording dash cam" (MVR), which records both video and audio through a microphone attached to an officer's vest. The MVR is activated when the police officer turns on the emergency overhead lights. Carideo testified he is aware he is being recorded once he turns on the overhead lights.
The MVR was played for the jury during trial. The jury was also given an unofficial transcription of the MVR. Carideo described for the jury what they were seeing on the video.
Carideo reported the stop to police dispatch, relaying the vehicle's license plate number and its color and make. As part of the report, Carideo testified he also stated "[u]nknown in[,] meaning unknown amount of occupants within the vehicle." The transcript also stated "unknown in."
According to Carideo, when he approached the vehicle, he did not know the driver but recognized the front passenger as the person driving the car during the prior stop-Latoya Martin. When Carideo stopped the car on the prior occasion, Martin did not have a valid driver's license-her license was suspended.
Carideo asked defendant her name. She replied: "Amy" and said she lived at 111 East Avondale Drive. In response to Carideo's request, defendant produced a North Carolina driver's license and the vehicle registration. The name on the license was Amy E. Brady; the photo was of defendant. Carideo said when he looked at the license, "[i]t appeared fake" because
When Carideo inputted the information into his vehicle's computer, the scan of the driver's license showed "a [Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV)] photo of a Caucasian female" named Amy Elizabeth Harriet Brady. The license, "verified through dispatch .... described the person to be five foot four with hazel eyes." The address on the license was 111 East Avondale Drive, Greensboro, North Carolina.
Carideo then asked defendant for an additional form of identification. She produced a credit card with the name Amy Brady on it. A second officer- Vincent Pelino-had arrived at the scene by this point to assist. He was also wearing an MVR.
The officers then asked defendant to step out of the vehicle, asking her for her Social Security number, prior addresses, current address, her birth date, and height. Defendant said she was five-foot-eight. The Social Security number and prior address given by defendant matched Amy Brady's information displayed on the computer.
Carideo used a blacklight to examine the license because he knew driver's licenses have holograms on them that will "illuminate" with black light; he said holograms on false driver's licenses often will not illuminate.
When Pelino informed defendant that the computer scan displayed a photo of a "Caucasian female," defendant asked to see the photo. As the officers showed defendant the photo on the computer screen, she "tried multiple times . . . to take the North Carolina driver's license from . . . Pelino's hands." Carideo said he "advised her, for her safety, to get out of the street, and go to the side, and just stand there for a moment."
At this point, Carideo "observed two males approaching the motor vehicle stop." He was "familiar" with one of the males-Sherman Martin, Latoya's brother, and was aware there were three active bench warrants issued for Sherman.[1] Carideo asked Sherman for his driver's license number and verified through dispatch the warrants were still active.
According to Pelino, defendant "grabbed [the North Carolina driver's license] out of [his] hand and refused to give it back after numerous commands to" do so. After Pelino told her she was under arrest, defendant began to run away. Carideo apprehended her. While defendant was on the ground, she continued to fight and resist the officers and their attempts to handcuff her. She refused to follow the officers' commands and take her hands out from underneath her body.
During the arrest, several items fell out of defendant's pocket, including a Family First card with the name Andrea Cummings on it. Defendant said the card belonged to her niece.
When Carideo asked defendant to get into the backseat of the police vehicle, she refused. After numerous requests, the officer used his hands to move defendant's legs into the car.
The officers never recovered the North Carolina driver's license despite Carideo, Pelino, and additional officers looking for it at the scene. Pelino testified they searched for two-and-a-half hours, and he later returned to the scene to search for another hour, but they never found the license. Carideo thought defendant might "have thrown it into the passenger front window [of the car], which was open with Latoya Martin sitting right there." But the officers did not find it in their later search of the car either.
In searching defendant's purse, the officers found the credit card with Amy Brady's name on it as well as other credit cards and a New Jersey driver's license.
Defendant stated none of the items belonged to her. Law enforcement later learned defendant's license was suspended.
When defendant was in the backseat of the police vehicle, she said she was having a panic attack and complained of head and neck pain. The officers called Basic Life Support (BLS) to the scene to check defendant's vital signs. BLS transported defendant to the hospital accompanied by Carideo.
When BLS asked defendant for her name, she said "[m]y name is unknown." She continued to tell BLS that was her first and last name, spelling it for them. She also said her date of birth was unknown.
Sherman told Pelino defendant's name was Andrea Cummings. After confirming defendant's identity through the computer system, Pelino called Carideo at the hospital and told him defendant's real name was Andrea Cummings. Defendant thereafter admitted to Carideo that her name was Andrea Cummings.
After police transported defendant from the hospital to police headquarters, defendant told Pelino that Latoya wanted defendant to drive the vehicle because Latoya's license was suspended. Latoya then went into another room and came out with the North Carolina license, credit cards, and other forms of identification which she gave to defendant.
During the trial, the State presented testimony that the credit card in defendant's purse with Amy Brady's name on it was not a real credit card. The prosecutor's office used a card reader and determined the credit card did not have a "real magnetic strip," and the card number "[wa]s not a real Discover number." An officer also contacted a woman named Amy Brady in Greensboro, North Carolina.
Defendant was charged in an indictment with third-degree fraudulent use of a credit card (count one), N.J.S.A. 2C:21-6(h); third-degree exhibiting a false driver's license (count two), N.J.S.A. 2C:21-2.1(c); fourth-degree hindering apprehension or prosecution (count three), N.J.S.A. 2C:29-3(b)(1); third-degree resisting arrest (count four), N.J.S.A. 2C:29-2(a)(3)(a); and fourth-degree tampering with physical evidence (count five), N.J.S.A. 2C:28-6(1).
In his...
To continue reading
Request your trial