People v. Napoletano

58 A.D.2d 83, 395 N.Y.S.2d 469, 1977 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 11834
CourtAppellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York
DecidedJune 13, 1977
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 58 A.D.2d 83 (People v. Napoletano) 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. Napoletano, 58 A.D.2d 83, 395 N.Y.S.2d 469, 1977 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 11834 (N.Y. Ct. App. 1977).

Opinion

Shapiro, J.

Defendants appeal from respective judgments of the Supreme Court, Westchester County, rendered October 27, 1976 as to Napoletano and November 5, 1976, upon resentence, as to Michael B., convicting Napoletano of the crime of attempted arson in the second degree and adjudicating Michael B. a youthful offender, upon his conviction of the same crime, and imposing sentence. The judgments are reversed and a new trial ordered.

the facts.

The premises which the two defendants, youths in their late teens, were charged with attempting to burn were Nathan’s Famous Restaurant in Yonkers, New York, at Central Avenue and Crisfield Street. The sole eyewitness testimony against them came from Howard Bloom, a manager at the restaurant. He testified that he saw them engaged in the acts which resulted in their conviction. His testimony was that at about 1:15 a.m. on May 23, 1975, while he was closing out the cash registers in Nathan’s, which had closed at 12:00 midnight, he heard glass breaking and looked outside the restaurant. He saw two young men walking across the porch area of the restaurant, which is 40 to 60 feet in length, pouring a liquid out of a red can which had a round bottom and a spout at the top. Bloom was about 60 feet from the two youths when he first saw them. Bloom ran from the counter to the doorway, stopping near the door at a point 10 or 15 feet from the defendants. He observed them for 10 or 15 seconds. He watched them walk down the steps of the porch, continuing to pour liquid from the can as they did so.

When the defendants looked up and saw Bloom approach[85]*85ing, they ran across Crisfield Street into an apartment complex across from Nathan’s. Bloom testified that during the time he observed the defendants he had a clear view of them and that the light was fairly good as half the lights inside of Nathan’s were on and there was a street light nearby.

Bloom also testified that he called to the other manager, who was inside the office, to phone the police and he remained standing in the doorway. Soon thereafter he saw a small blue car come out of the apartment complex, drive down Crisfield Street and go by him slowly, and stop at the red light at Central Avenue and, when that light turned green, make a left turn onto Central Avenue. The two youths in it looked like those he had seen on the porch. The taller youth looked like the one he had seen on the porch, though he was in a T-shirt instead of the jacket he had been wearing when he was on the porch. He was seated on the front passenger side of the blue car.

The police arrived a few minutes later and Bloom gave them a description of the two youths. One, the shorter, was about 16 or 17 years old, with mod-length hair, 5 feet and 6 or 7 inches tall, and wore a white T-shirt with writing and a picture on it. He had been carrying the can. The second was 6 feet tall, a little older, about 18 or 19 years old. He was wearing a dark jacket and had longer hair pushed behind his ears. Bloom testified that the police then examined the liquid and got into their car and left, returning some 10 or 15 minutes later, followed by the blue car Bloom had earlier seen leaving the apartment project. When the police and the two youths got out of their respective cars, Bloom saw them and said: "Those are the two.”

The second witness for the People was Yonkers Police Officer Rasulo, one of the two officers who had responded to the call from Nathan’s. His testimony was that he and his partner spoke to Bloom, who told them what he had seen, described the two youths he had seen and told them about the small blue car he had seen later containing the defendants. The officers then checked the porch and observed and smelled a 45-foot length of gasoline saturation on the upper part of the walk and on the porch; they made a search of the area but could find neither the defendants nor the gas can. While Officer Rasulo was standing outside the radio car on the sidewalk, he saw a small blue car approaching slowly on Central Avenue. It speeded up after the two occupants saw [86]*86the group at Nathan’s. He then called his partner and they gave chase in their police car and stopped the vehicle and asked the driver, defendant Michael B., for his license and registration. While so doing, Officer Rasulo noted a strong odor of gasoline inside the car; when he questioned the car’s occupants about it, he was told that they had worked on a car at 8:00 or 9:00 o’clock at defendant Napoletano’s house. The officer then asked the defendants to follow them back to Nathan’s. They did so. The officer then testffied that when they emerged from their car at Nathan’s, Bloom blurted out that that’s the two and that’s the car. ” The defendants were then placed under arrest and advised of their rights. Before they were placed, handcuffed, in the patrol car, Officer Rasulo’s partner, Police Officer Leinen, searched the defendants and found two books of matches in Napoletano’s right hand pants pocket and, when he touched the bottom of his trousers, found that the bottom four inches were damp and smelled of gasoline. When he and his partner searched defendants’ car, they found a gray coat lying on the back seat behind the passenger side.

The next witness for the People, Patrolman Leinen, corroborated his partner’s testimony as to what they had been told by Bloom, the gasoline which their inspection showed had been spread at Nathan’s on the south side of the building, the unsuccessful search for the gas can, the observation of the blue car with two occupants approaching on Central Avenue and of the pursuit of the vehicle, the questioning of its occupants, their return to Nathan’s, the identffication of the defendants and of their car by Bloom and the arrest and search of the defendants and the car after they were advised of their rights.

The defense offered the testimony of two alibi witnesses, Napoletano’s younger brother Anthony, and Mark Chiulli, a friend of both defendants, who testified that both defendants had been working on a car in Napoletano’s private garage and were elsewhere at the time of the crime. Both defendants also testified in their own defense. Napoletano testified that he and Michael B. had worked at his garage on the night of May 22, 1975 until about 12:00 or 12:30 a.m. on the. morning of May 23. They worked on an old roadster which he had bought as a kit for completion of its assembly, they had put gas in it and got it running and then found a leak in the fuel line and replaced that line. At about 12:50 a.m. they left and went to Andy’s [87]*87Delicatessen on Central Avenue in Yonkers and stayed there for about a half hour. While there he had seen one of his alibi witnesses, Mark Chiulli, who left at about 1:30 a.m. He denied that he had worn a jacket, stating that he had been wearing his blue gas station shirt, which he had worn all evening and when he went out later with Michael B. He also testified that during the time he and Michael B. were working on the roadster, a friend of his, George Raffaeli, had stopped in and stayed about half an hour or 45 minutes and then left. After Chiulli left he and Michael B. "hung around” Andy’s Deli and then left, driving up Central Avenue. As they slowed down for the light near Nathan’s, they saw a police car there with one officer in the car and the other on the stairway. When the light changed they continued up Central Avenue; the police pulled them over as they were making a U-turn in order to go back down Central Avenue. They then followed the police back to Nathan’s where, when they emerged, Bloom came over and said: "That’s them”.

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Bluebook (online)
58 A.D.2d 83, 395 N.Y.S.2d 469, 1977 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 11834, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-napoletano-nyappdiv-1977.