People v. Buford

37 A.D.2d 38, 324 N.Y.S.2d 100, 1971 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 3797
CourtAppellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York
DecidedJune 21, 1971
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 37 A.D.2d 38 (People v. Buford) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Buford, 37 A.D.2d 38, 324 N.Y.S.2d 100, 1971 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 3797 (N.Y. Ct. App. 1971).

Opinion

Hopkins, J.

The defendant was indicted for the crime of murder in the first degree. He was accused of slaying Yvonne Dove ‘ by striking her on the head with a sharp instrument and by manually strangling her He was convicted after a jury trial of murder in the second degree.

The defendant raises several grounds for reversal of the judgment, including a claim that his guilt was not established beyond a reasonable doubt. Though the evidence presented by the People was wholly circumstantial, we do not think that the jury’s finding of guilt ventured beyond the traditional test required of circumstantial evidence—that the proof point logically to guilt and exclude to a moral certainty every other reasonable hypothesis (People v. Harris, 306 N. Y. 345, 351; People v. Cleague, 22 N Y 2d 363, 365-366). In our opinion, the evidence against the defendant met this standard.

The defendant also complains that certain exhibits were received into evidence without a showing of connection to the victim. He refers to scrapings taken from the defendant’s fingernails, and body tissue removed from the scene of the killing (the victim’s apartment), as well as items of furniture and other physical evidence found at the scene. We see no error in the admission of any of these exhibits into evidence.

The defendant asserts that a statement made by him to the police was erroneously received into evidence, first on the ground that he was illegally taken into custody and hence any incriminating admissions must be suppressed, and second because the statement was taken in violation of the requirements of Miranda v. Arizona (384 U. S. 436). Neither of these grounds is tenable. Probable cause existed for the arrest of the defendant; and the proof established that the Miranda warnings were given to the defendant before he was questioned.

Finally, the defendant argues that his rights under due process were infringed by the failure of the People to disclose to him prior to trial the contents of a report made by one of the investigating policemen, Sergeant Chous. In that report, Sergeant Chous stated that another police officer had informed him that an unknown colored male had said that one John Sinclair had committed the murder and that he (Sergeant Chous) had interviewed the informant who gave him hearsay information about the victim. The report also stated that Chous had talked to a Mrs. McMillan who told him she had seen the victim alive but bleed[40]*40ing from a head, wound on the afternoon prior to the discovery of the body. Other information in the Chons report indicated that the defendant was also known by the name of John Sinclair.

We do not think that due process was offended by the nondisclosure of the report to the defendant. First, the defendant was apprised of Mrs. McMillan’s statement during the trial and was thereby enabled to examine her and Sergeant Chous on that point (cf. People v. Fein, 18 N Y 2d 162). Second, we see no duty on the part of the People to inform the defendant that a person, not shown to be a witness, had identified the defendant under an alias.

Thus, the conviction should be affirmed. One question remains. During the course of our examination of this appeal, it was found that certain photographic exhibits received into evidence were not available for review. The missing exhibits fall into two groups:

1. - Exhibits 1, 2, 3, 4, 27, 28, 34, 35 and 36 have been reproduced and have been examined by us. The District Attorney has certified them to be duplicates of the original exhibits. His certification has been accepted by the defendant’s counsel on this appeal. The Public Defender, who represented the defendant at the trial, states that he has no reason to dispute the District Attorney’s statement.1 A description of these exhibits appears in the footnotes.2

2. Exhibits 7, 34 and 35 have not been reproduced and apparently are not in existence. A description of these photographs [41]*41has been furnished by the District Attorney. His descriptions have not been objected to by the defendant’s counsel. The Public Defender finds no fault with the descriptions, though he notes that he has no way of verifying them. The description of these exhibits as supplied by the District Attorney also appears in the footnotes.3

The disappearance of the original exhibits is accounted for by the District Attorney as a result of a complete alteration of the offices of the County Clerk and District Attorney between the time of the trial and the hearing of the appeal, during which time the exhibits were moved to temporary quarters and thus apparently lost. The court, following its discovery of the absence of the exhibits, requested the District Attorney, the defendant’s counsel and the Public Defender to appear before it and to inform it as to the existence of the original exhibits and whether their presence was essential to the determination of the appeal. Following this hearing, letters have been received by the court from counsel and the Public Defender which convince us that the original exhibits cannot be located, that the duplicates submitted by the District Attorney can be examined by us for the purposes of this appeal and that the three missing exhibits do not prevent a consideration of the issues upon appeal.

As the duplicate photographs have been certified to us by the District Attorney and not disputed by other counsel, we think that no barrier as to the loss of the originals arises to forestall review. The three exhibits not before us in any form offer greater question.

We first observe that two of the missing exhibits (Nos. 34, 35) depict parts of the victim’s apartment, which is the subject of other photographs before us as duplicates of original exhibits (cf. Nos. 4, 27, 28, 36). To that extent they are merely repetitive. The other missing exhibit is a photograph of the defendant taken at the time of his arrest and indicating the clothing then worn by him. We do not see how the absence of this photograph prevents review, since it is not connected with and does not bear upon any of the arguments raised by the defendant on appeal. Neither the defendant’s counsel nor the Public Defender suggests that the presence of these exhibits is vital to the defend[42]*42ant’s presentation of Ms grounds for reversal or that their absence is prejudicial to the defendant.

We have said that a “ judgment of conviction must be reversed whenever, by the action of the State or any of its agencies or agents, the defendant has been effectively deprived of his statutory right to appeal ” (People v. Mininni, 21 A D 2d 811). In that case the trial minutes had been destroyed (see, also, People v. Kaplan, 278 App. Div. 665; People v. Keefe, 254 App. Div. 683; People v. Lomoso, 284 App. Div. 670; People ex rel. Berry v. De Wilkowska, 246 App. Div. 285). In People v. Adams (22 A D 2d 892) we reversed the judgment because the minutes of the summations had been destroyed. In all of these cases the defendant was clearly prejudiced because what was missing in the record was both irretrievable and disabling. In People v. Genova (15 A D 2d 44) a judgment convicting the defendant of possession of obscene prints was reversed because the prints themselves had been lost.

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37 A.D.2d 38, 324 N.Y.S.2d 100, 1971 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 3797, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-buford-nyappdiv-1971.