People v. Garcia

19 A.D.3d 17, 795 N.Y.S.2d 216
Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York·Decided May 19, 2005·Published·Cited by 11 cases

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT

Saxe, J.E

Defendant correctly asserted, in his pro se motion pursuant to CPL 440.10 to vacate his conviction, that his trial counsel failed to properly represent him during the plea negotiations in his prosecution on a robbery charge. Specifically, it is undisputed that in the course of plea discussions, the prosecutor and the trial court misapprehended defendant’s status for sentencing purposes, and defense counsel failed to ascertain and correct this misapprehension. Counsel’s representation in this respect, as a matter of law, fell below the requirements of reasonably effective assistance. Under these circumstances, defendant’s assertions were sufficient to warrant an evidentiary hearing to determine whether it is reasonably probable that an acceptable plea bargain would have been reached but for counsel’s failure.

On December 17, 1996, the court dismissed the initial robbery indictment obtained against defendant, with leave to represent, based upon the violation of defendant’s right to testify before the grand jury (CPL 190.50 [5] [a]). Before proceeding further, the People offered defendant a plea bargain of 16 years to life for a plea to a reduced charge of a class C felony, which offer would only remain open until they re-presented the matter to the grand jury. The offered sentence was based on the incorrect assumption that defendant was a persistent violent felony offender rather than a second violent felony offender, and [19]*19was the lowest term available for a persistent violent felony offender. The confusion regarding defendant’s sentencing status appears to have arisen because defendant had been sentenced on the same day for two prior violent felonies, which therefore could not be treated as two separate predicate convictions for purposes of Penal Law § 70.08 (1) (b) (see People v Morse, 62 NY2d 205 [1984]).

The correct range of sentences for the top charged count of robbery in the first degree, a class B felony, as a second violent felony offender, was actually a determinate sentence between 10 and 25 years (Penal Law § 70.04 [3] [a]), and for a plea to a reduced, class C felony, the range would have been a determinate term between 7 and 15 years (Penal Law § 70.04 [3] [b]).

Defendant rejected the 16 years to life offer and testified before the grand jury, and was again indicted for robbery in the first degree, robbery in the second degree, and criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree. After his conviction at trial, he was sentenced as a second violent felony offender to an aggregate determinate term of 25 years. This Court affirmed the conviction (277 AD2d 68 [2000], lv denied 96 NY2d 759 [2001]).

Although his moving affidavit is inartfully phrased, defendant’s motion to set aside the conviction is premised upon the assertion that while he felt induced to reject the offer of 16 years to life, it was reasonably probable that he would have accepted a plea bargain and not proceeded to trial if counsel had determined and pointed out his actual sentencing status, correctly informed him of the possible range of sentences in the event of conviction, and elicited a plea offer from the prosecutor reflecting defendant’s actual sentencing status.

Admittedly, defendant’s initial moving affidavit reflects that at the time of the CPL 440.10 motion he continued to be mistaken as to his correct sentencing status and the possible range of sentences, inasmuch as he asserted that he “could only be sentenced as a first felony offender” and that the proper sentence was an indeterminate sentence of between 6 to 25 years for the top count of robbery in the first degree. However, these errors do not detract from the essential premise, that his trial counsel failed to realize and point out defendant’s true sentencing status so as to obtain a plea offer in line with that status, and that such an offer would have been a substantial improvement over the erroneous offer of 16 years to life imprisonment, a term substantially in excess of the term which [20]*20could have been offered had defense counsel pointed out the error.

In order to be entitled to reversal for ineffective assistance of counsel under the federal constitutional standard, a defendant must demonstrate that counsel’s representation fell below an objective standard of reasonableness, and that there is a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s error, the result of the proceeding would have been different (see Strickland v Washington, 466 US 668, 688, 694 [1984]; Pham v United States, 317 F3d 178, 182 [2003]). Under the New York State standard, prejudice is examined more generally, and the question is whether the defendant received meaningful representation, an inquiry which focuses on the fairness of the proceedings as a whole rather than any particular impact on the outcome of the case (see People v Henry, 95 NY2d 563 [2000]; People v Benevento, 91 NY2d 708 [1998]).

That the first prong of the test is satisfied, in that counsel’s representation fell below an objective standard of reasonableness, is established by Mask v McGinnis (28 F Supp 2d 122 [1998], affd 233 F3d 132 [2000], cert denied 534 US 943 [2001]). The Mask case, like the matter now before us, involved a mistaken belief on the part of counsel and the court that the defendant was a persistent violent felony offender. In that case, notwithstanding this Court’s decision on direct appeal that there was “no reasonable probability that a more favorable plea bargain would have been struck but for the mistake” (People v Mack [also known as Mask], 223 AD2d 383 [1996], lv denied 88 NY2d 989 [1996]), a writ of habeas corpus was granted to the defendant by the Federal District Court (see Mask v McGinnis, supra). With respect to the first prong of the Strickland standard, the federal court held that due to counsel’s failure to detect and correct the court’s and prosecutor’s mistaken impression of defendant’s sentencing status during plea discussions, the defendant “was not properly advised and he was not properly represented in the plea negotiations” (28 F Supp 2d at 125).

The second prong of the Strickland test requires a showing that the defendant was prejudiced by counsel’s failure, generally by showing “a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different” (Strickland, 466 US at 694). In Mask, that standard was satisfied, since the submitted documents established that (1) the defendant asserted that while he rejected the plea [21]*21offer of 10 years to life because it was unreasonable, a reasonable offer would have been 8 to 16 years, and that he would have pleaded guilty had the prosecution offered a sentence of less than 10 years to life, and (2) the record demonstrated that the prosecutor would have been willing to offer a more favorable plea but for her mistaken belief that the defendant was a persistent violent felony offender (28 F Supp 2d at 125-126). Consequently, the court in Mask reasoned, “a reasonable possibility exist[ed] that if defense counsel had pointed out that petitioner was not a persistent violent felony offender, additional negotiations would have been pursued and the prosecutor probably would have been willing to offer a sentence lower than ten to life, including a sentence in the rangé that petitioner would have found reasonable—eight to sixteen years” (28 F Supp 2d at 126).

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People v. Garcia, 19 A.D.3d 17, 795 N.Y.S.2d 216 (N.Y. Ct. App. 2005).

19 A.D.3d 17 (People v. Garcia) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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