People v. White (Rodney)

• Court: Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York
• Decided: June 13, 2017
• Docket: 2017 NYSlipOp 50788(U)
• Status: Published

Opinion

The People of the State of New York,

against

Rodney White, Defendant-Appellant.

Defendant appeals from a judgment of the Criminal Court of the City of New York, New York County (Kate Paek, J.), rendered April 8, 2015, convicting him, upon his plea of guilty, of criminal possession of a controlled substance in the seventh degree, and imposing sentence.

Per Curiam.

Judgment of conviction (Kate Paek, J.), rendered April 8, 2015, affirmed.

The accusatory instrument was not jurisdictionally defective. The deponent police officer's allegations that at a specified time and location, he "took one pipe containing crack/cocaine residue" from inside defendant's pocket and that the officer believed the substance to be crack/cocaine "based on [his] professional training as a police officer in the identification of drugs, [his] prior experience as a police officer making drug arrests and an observation of the packaging, which is characteristic of this type of drug" sufficed to show the basis for the conclusion that the substance at issue was a controlled substance (see People v Smalls, 26 NY3d 1064 [2015]; People v Kalin, 12 NY3d 225, 231-232 [2009]; People v Pearson, 78 AD3d 445 [2010], lv denied 16 NY3d 799 [2011).

THIS CONSTITUTES THE DECISION AND ORDER OF THE COURT.

I concur I concur I concur
Decision Date: June 13, 2017