People v. Lent

29 Misc. 3d 14
CourtAppellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York
DecidedJuly 16, 2010
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 29 Misc. 3d 14 (People v. Lent) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court 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. Lent, 29 Misc. 3d 14 (N.Y. Ct. App. 2010).

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT

Memorandum.

Ordered that the judgments of conviction are affirmed.

Following a jury trial, defendant was convicted of driving while intoxicated per se (Vehicle and Traffic Law § 1192 [2]) and speeding (Vehicle and Traffic Law § 1180 [b]). At the trial, a Nassau County police officer testified that he was trained to estimate the speed of a moving vehicle and that, on March 11, 2007 at 4:58 a.m., he observed defendant traveling at about 90 miles per hour on the Long Island Expressway. The officer confirmed that estimate by a laser device and by his speedometer during the subsequent pursuit. The officer stopped defendant and noted that defendant exhibited several indicia of intoxication. Defendant admitted having had “one drink.” The officer administered a series of field sobriety tests, all of which defendant failed. The officer arrested defendant at 5:23 a.m. and transported defendant to the Nassau County Police Department’s Central Testing Unit, where defendant again failed a series of sobriety tests and consented to a chemical test of the alcohol content of his blood. The test, conducted at 7:24 a.m. by an Intoxilyzer 5000 EN breath test instrument, produced a reading of .11% by weight.

Defendant sought to introduce expert testimony as to the range of individual variation within the general population from the 2,100:1 “conversion” or “partition” ratio used in the Intoxilyzer 5000 EN to derive the concentration of alcohol in a person’s blood from the quantity of alcohol vapor detected in a breath sample. Defendant did not challenge the instrument’s reliability, but sought to lay the foundation for a jury argument that defendant’s individual ratio might differ so significantly from the mean as to diminish the evidentiary weight to be accorded the test results. The District Court precluded the evidence, apparently on relevancy grounds.

The scientific accuracy of “[b]reath analysis instruments” approved by the New York State Department of Health (Department of Health Regulations [10 NYCRR] § 59.4 [a]; see Vehicle and Traffic Law § 1194 [4] [c]) is “no longer open to question” (People v Alvarez, 70 NY2d 375, 380 [1987], quoting People v Mertz, 68 NY2d 136, 148 [1986]), and the Intoxilyzer 5000 EN [17]*17is one of those approved instruments (Department of Health Regulations [10 NYCRR] § 59.4 [b]). A consequence of the general acceptance in the scientific community of the reliability of the results of blood alcohol testing by such instruments (People v Hughes, 59 NY2d 523, 537 [1983]) is that it is no longer necessary to establish, through foundational evidence, the reliability of the test results by means of expert testimony (People v Hampe, 181 AD2d 238, 240 [1992]). The presumption of reliability extends to the scientific premises underlying the operation of breath test instruments, including the validity of the partition or conversion ratio.

Although the fact, if not the magnitude, of conversion ratio variability is well established (e.g. People v McNeal, 46 Cal 4th 1183, 1191-1192, 210 P3d 420, 424-425 [2009]; cf. People v Donaldson, 36 AD2d 37 [1971]; see generally David Polin, Annotation, Challenges to Use of Breath Tests for Drunk Drivers Based on Claim that Partition or Conversion Ratio between Measured Breath Alcohol and Actual Blood Alcohol is Inaccurate, 90 ALR4th 155), as a general rule, evidence of such variability may not be introduced to challenge the reliability of instruments that determine blood alcohol levels from the analysis of breath samples (e.g. People v McNeal, 46 Cal 4th at 1192, 210 P3d at 425; Guthrie v Jones, 202 Ariz 273, 43 P3d 601 [2002]; State v Hanks, 172 Vt 93, 772 A2d 1087 [2001]; Morris v State, Dept. of Admin., Div. of Motor Vehs., 186 P3d 575, 581 [Alaska 2008]; State v Hardesty, 136 Idaho 707, 39 P3d 647 [2002]). In the District Court, defense counsel, conceding that “[n]obody knows what [defendant’s] ratio was,” argued, in effect, that the mere theoretical possibility that defendant’s personal conversion ratio so differed from the ratio employed by the Intoxilyzer 5000 EN as to meaningfully diminish the weight to be accorded the test results. Therefore, counsel argued, evidence of conversion ratio variability within the population should be admissible without proof of defendant’s own conversion ratio. We disagree.

Absent proof by defendant that his personal conversion ratio differs so significantly from the mean as to materially undermine the weight to be given the test result, it cannot be said that the test so erroneously recorded his blood alcohol content as to render his conviction wrongful. “Evidence, although technically relevant, will be excluded if it is too slight, remote, or conjectural to have any legitimate influence in determining the fact in is[18]*18sue” (Prince, Richardson on Evidence § 4-103, at 137-138 [Farrell 11th ed]; see e.g. People v Petty, 7 NY3d 277, 286 [2006]; People v Mateo, 2 NY3d 383, 424-425 [2004]). Thus, the District Court did not abuse its discretion in rejecting defendant’s offer of proof which, while involving matters not theoretically irrelevant, was not shown to have probative value above the “slight, remote, or conjectural” and amounted to little more than an invitation to speculate.

Defendant also argues that Melendez-Diaz v Massachusetts (557 US —, 129 S Ct 2527 [2009]) overruled this court’s determination in People v Lebrecht (13 Misc 3d 45 [App Term, 9th & 10th Jud Dists 2006]) that a defendant’s confrontation rights (see Crawford v Washington, 541 US 36 [2004]) are not violated in a driving while intoxicated prosecution when the trial court admits, as business records (see CPLR 4518), certified copies of the simulator solution certification and the calibration/ maintenance documentation in relation to the breath test instrument, offered as part of the foundation requirements for the admission of the blood alcohol test results, without the preparer of those records being available for cross-examination (see also People v Stevenson, 21 Misc 3d 128[A], 2008 NY Slip Op 51933[U] [App Term, 1st Dept 2008]; People v Fisher, 9 Misc 3d 1121[A], 2005 NY Slip Op 51726[U] [Rochester City Ct 2005]; People v Kanhai, 8 Misc 3d 447 [Crim Ct, Queens County 2005]).

In Melendez-Diaz, the Supreme Court concluded that the Commonwealth of Massachusetts had denied the defendant his Sixth Amendment confrontation rights by permitting a certified laboratory report of the analysis of a substance seized from the defendant to be offered into evidence without the necessity of presenting the analyst as a witness. Noting that “there is little reason to believe that confrontation will be useless in testing [an analyst’s] honesty, proficiency, and methodology” (Melendez-Diaz, 557 US at —, 129 S Ct at 2538), the Supreme Court excluded from the reach of the business records rule the product of “regularly conducted business activity [the purpose of which] is the production of evidence for use at trial” (id.) as inherently testimonial. However, the Court also recognized that there exist

“[b]usiness and public records [which] are generally admissible absent confrontation not because they qualify under an exception to the hearsay rules, but because — having been created for the administration of an entity’s affairs and not for the purpose of [19]

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

People v. Curtis
2025 NY Slip Op 51060(U) (New York Criminal Court, 2025)
People v. Bryan (Abrie)
Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York, 2019
People v. Morales (Cristian)
Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York, 2017
People v. Turner (Robert)
Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York, 2016
People v. McCombs
47 Misc. 3d 44 (Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York, 2015)
People v. Hao Lin
46 Misc. 3d 20 (Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York, 2014)
People v. Maldonado
42 Misc. 3d 81 (Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York, 2013)
People v. Harris
40 Misc. 3d 715 (Criminal Court of the City of New York, 2013)
People v. Bohrer
37 Misc. 3d 370 (Penfield Justice Court, 2012)
People v. Jones
33 Misc. 3d 181 (Criminal Court of the City of New York, 2011)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
29 Misc. 3d 14, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-lent-nyappterm-2010.