New York Criminal Lawyer Blog

A man was charged with robbery in the first, second and third degrees, grand larceny in the fourth degree, criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree and unlawful possession of marihuana . A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said that all proceedings have been completed and the case was sent to the Court for trial.

The charges stems from an incident in which the complainant was robbed with a knife. The knife allegedly used by the man during the said incident was not recovered. At a pre-trial conference, the jury requested the court's permission to present evidence that approximately two weeks prior to the occurrence which comprises the charges in the instant case. It was a police officer who observed the man in possession of a knife which is similar to the description given by the complainant about the knife used in robbing.

A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the Supreme Court ruled that the testimony relating to the observation of the knife would be admissible at trial on the issue of identity and to complete the narrative. The man then claimed that the observation of the knife was the result of improper interference with his liberty by the police. An evidentiary hearing was held and the police officer was the only witness at the hearing. The court then found his testimony to be credible and made findings of fact and conclusions of law.

At the hearing, the police officer alleged that he was assigned to the intelligence division of the 48th precinct. He had also received numerous narcotics complaints from several locations in the area known as a drug prone location. Several complaints involving the sale of crack cocaine and heroin had also been received relating to a social club at the intersection. He further stated that when he and his partner approached the said corner with plainclothes and driving an unmarked police vehicle, they noted that several persons were congregating on the corner. As the police vehicle approached, one of the people on the corner leaned over and whispered something to the man who immediately took two steps back and runs and turns to the corner heading southbound. As he got closer the corner, the man turned and ran.

The officers followed the man and abruptly stopped the car next to the man within several feet of the corner. Their intention was to find out what he was running for. The man turned and looked at the police officers. When the officer yelled and asked why he was running, the man did not respond. The man stopped running and appeared to crouch down slightly behind a parked car and his hands looked like they were close to his jacket pockets. The officer didn’t know if the man had a weapon on him or if he's dropping anything to the ground. He can't tell because the man’s hands were hidden from his view.

As the officer exited his vehicle, he told the man if he can see the man’s hands. As the officer’s partner approached, the man stated that all he got was a weed. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the man was then placed under arrest and 19 glassine envelopes of marihuana were recovered from him.

At the time of the arrest, the police also recovered a small folding knife with a white and glossy handle. The officer believed that the blade was less than four inches long which is not illegal to carry in public. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the man was given a summons regarding the marihuana possession and the knife. Consequently, the jury’s application to present evidence that approximately two weeks prior to the alleged crime from which the officer observed the man in possession of a knife is denied.

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Family Court deals with many issues that cross over from criminal court. It is not unusual for a criminal court issue to have family court repercussions. That was the case for a family on Mother’s Day 2003. A sixteen year old boy exposed himself and masturbated in front of a five year old female cousin. The incident occurred at a family gathering where most of the family was present. The boy’s Aunt and her brother, his Uncle found themselves on different sides of the argument surrounding this boy’s behavior. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said that since the entire family split over the events of that day, this brother and sister continued to argue and ultimately began to file criminal and family court petitions against one another.

It appears that shortly after Mother’s Day of 2003, the Aunt confronted the five year old while she was at school. The Aunt was an employee of the school. The Uncle claims that the Aunt interrogated the child about the events of that day and that this encounter left the child frightened. The child told her father that she did not want to talk to or see her Aunt ever again. The Uncle confronted his sister about this incident and the situation went downhill from this point. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said another family member became involved and rumors amongst the family members increased. This family member told the Aunt that she had spoken to the Uncle and that he had gotten orders of protection against the Aunt.

The Aunt filed suit in family court alleging that the Uncle had defamed her and caused interference with her employment. On December 20, 2004, the Uncle filed a motion to dismiss the complaint filed by the Aunt. On March 18, 2005, the Family Court granted the Uncles motion to dismiss the Aunt’s entire complaint. The Aunt appealed this decision. The court reviewed the topics under discussion.

They consist of allegations from the Uncle that the Aunt filed a false police report against him. He maintained that on September 5, 2004, he told another family member that the Aunt had accused him of pulling a gun on her. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the facts show that there is no evidence that a police report was ever issued and does not exist. Apparently, the Aunt repeated to another member of the family that she considered this allegation to be defamatory to her as well as the comments supposedly also made by the Uncle to other family members and to the Aunt’s supervisor at work that he had a court order to keep the Aunt away from his children.

The court determined that the comments made by both family members were short of anything that could be considered defamatory. This was decided because simply stating that the Uncle had a court order, was not enough to assume by anyone who had not read the court order that the Aunt had done anything wrong. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said it was also proven by a sworn deposition from the other family member that the insults had never happened. The court addressed this issue and the Aunt countered by stating that the other family member had told her about the conversation and that she had made the allegations that the Uncle had made the defamatory comments about her. The court found that under oath, the other family member had clearly denied that this conversation ever took place and maintained that the Uncle never said anything that could be defined as defamatory.

The court, as a result of hearing this information, determined that there was no issue in factual dispute between these parties that would require a trial. The alleged slander did not occur because there are many different interpretations that can be made regarding the comments. Since none of these comments were clearly defamatory, a case for slander could not be made even if as the Aunt claimed, the Uncle made them to her supervisor at an elementary school. She felt that the allegations, about a court order, was sufficient to create an issue for her at her place of business, the court disagreed. The court found in favor of the Uncle and dismissed all allegations granting a summary judgment.

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In the fall of 2005, residents of the six-story Housing Authority apartment building complained to the Police Department's Housing Bureau about criminal law violations, trespassing in the building, crack possession and drug sales occurring in the building's lobby. The police officer’s superiors in the Bureau passed on the complaint to him, and he thereafter performed daily vertical patrols of the building. During the fall and winter, he participated in ten to fifteen trespass or narcotics arrests in the building, most in the lobby. The prevalent illegal activity was not curtailed until early March.

A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said on the night of February 14, 2006, the police officer and his partner entered the building in plainclothes, their guns holstered but their shields displayed, to conduct a vertical patrol on their own initiative. As the officers entered the well-lit lobby, the accused, whom the police officer did not recognize, was standing by the lobby elevator, about ten feet from the officers and face-to-face with them, conversing with a man. The police officer could not hear what was being said.

The officer announced that they were the police. The man said something to the accused, and the accused fled towards a stairwell leading from the lobby to the upper stories of the building. The officers ran after him, calling them out to stop. As the accused ran up the stairs, between the ground and second stories, the officer, trailing shortly behind, saw the accused throw or drop several small green baggies. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the police officer recognized them from his training and past arrests to be characteristic crack-cocaine packaging, and believed they contained crack-cocaine. The officer called the accused to stop but he kept running.

The officer finally caught up with the accused on the fifth floor, where he found the accused knocking on an apartment door. The officer drew his gun, and ordered the accused to remove his hands from his pockets. When the accused failed to do so, the officer pushed him against the wall and they rear-cuffed him. The officer asked the accused his name and where he lived. At some point on the fifth floor, persons in the apartment that the accused had been trying to enter told the police they knew him. The accused at some point told the police that he did not live in the building.

After apprehending the accused, the officer went back to where the accused had thrown the baggies, and recovered four small green baggies of cocaine just a few steps above the door leading from the lobby to the stairwell. The man who was with the accused before the chase, still downstairs, was arrested on a charge of loitering for the purpose of using narcotics.
The police brought the accused to the station house. He was searched and the officers recovered money from his pockets. At about 1:22 a.m. that night, the officer helped the accused make a telephone call to his mother, and stood by while the accused spoke to her.

The officer heard the accused tell his mother he ran, but they didn't find him with anything.
As noted, the accused seeks suppression on the grounds that the police lacked adequate justification to approach him to request information, and to pursue him when he fled. The arguments state no claim under the Fourth Amendment as the accused seemingly do not dispute.

In this regard, a police officer's mere approaching of an individual in a public place, and the officer's putting of questions to him, does not constitute a Fourth Amendment seizure absent circumstances which would lead a reasonable person to conclude that he was not free to leave. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the Fourth Amendment accordingly does not interdict such inquiries, even if carried out without any basis for suspecting the person questioned. The accused man’s complaint that the police lacked adequate justification to question him in the lobby therefore finds no support in the Fourth Amendment.

Nor is a person seized within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment when the police pursue or otherwise attempt to detain him, but have not yet laid hands on him, and he has not submitted to their authority. Accordingly, the Fourth Amendment affords no basis either for suppressing the direct fruits of such a pursuit, such as property jettisoned by the fleeing suspect, or for suppressing the fruits of an ensuing seizure of the fugitive on the ground that the seizure was justified only by observations during the putatively-improper pursuit. Accordingly, the accused man’s complaint that the police pursuit was improper affords no federal basis for suppression New York, however, regulates police conduct more thoroughly. As a matter of State common law, even police-citizen encounters which do not rise to the seizure level are governed by court-crafted rules intended to balance the needs of law enforcement against citizens' interests in avoiding unjustified harassment. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the New York courts have forbidden police officers, on pain of suppression, from initiating questioning for law-enforcement purposes absent an objective, credible reason, not necessarily indicative of criminality.

Further, the Court of Appeals, construing the State Constitution, has rejected the conclusion that a seizure of the person requires physical apprehension or submission to authority. Rather, under New York law, one may be seized if the police action results in a significant interruption of the individual's liberty of movement. In particular, police pursuit of a fleeing suspect has been determined to constitute a limited detention or infringement on freedom of movement, rising to seizure level.

Indeed, as a matter of State constitutional law, the police are forbidden from pursuing a fleeing suspect absent reasonable suspicion that the suspect has committed or is about to commit a crime. Reasonable suspicion represents that quantum of knowledge sufficient to induce an ordinarily prudent and cautious person under the circumstances to believe criminal activity is at hand. Even flight which frustrates a proper police inquiry does not, absent reasonable suspicion, permit pursuit.

The accused stakes his claim on these State-law principles. More particularly, he asserts that the officer and his partner possessed no objective, credible reason to question him in the lobby, and that their approach for that purpose was therefore unauthorized. Further, he asserts that they lacked reasonable suspicion justifying their pursuit when he fled.
The accused is charged with criminal crack possession. The court contend that as the police approached the accused in the apartment building lobby, the accused fled, throwing cocaine to the ground as the police pursued. By motion papers filed, the accused moved to suppress the drugs and statements he made in the wake of his arrest. The court opposed the motion in papers dated. By an oral order and worksheet endorsement, the court ordered that a hearing be held to resolve the parties' conflicting positions.

Following the hearing, the parties submitted legal memoranda which clarified their positions. In a letter-brief, the accused contends that the police lacked adequate justification both to approach to question him, and to pursue when he ran. He contends that police testimony to his throwing the drugs, and the drugs themselves, should be suppressed as the fruits of asserted improprieties. While his brief does not explicitly address the statements, his position seemingly implies that they should likewise be suppressed as fruits of the intrusions which precipitated his arrest. The court opposed the contentions. According to the court, the police were justified in approaching the accused to request information and in pursuing him when he fled. The court stress, throughout all the post-hearing submissions, that the officer’s inquiry, which the accused man’s flight frustrated, was legitimate.

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The Facts of the Case:

A New York Drug Posession Lawyer said the plaintiff was a tenant in a building located at Academy Street in Manhattan, owned by defendant-one and managed by defendant-two.

On 26 February 2002, in the early afternoon, plaintiff entered the building through the lone entrance available to the tenants. A man whom plaintiff did not recognize entered the building immediately after her. The man walked ahead of plaintiff up a staircase, which plaintiff was using to reach her unit on the second floor. As plaintiff opened the door to her apartment, the man, who had continued up the staircase when plaintiff walked from the staircase to her unit, ran down the staircase and pushed plaintiff into the apartment. The man then sexually assaulted plaintiff at gunpoint.

Plaintiff commenced an action to recover damages for personal injuries.

Plaintiff claims that defendants failed to provide adequate security for the building; that defendants failed to maintain a working lock on the door to the tenants' entrance, which failure allowed the assailant to gain entry to the building and assault plaintiff.

A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the defendants jointly moved for a summary judgment dismissing the complaint on the ground that the assault was not foreseeable; arguing that, although there was drug activity in the surrounding neighborhood, there was no history of criminal activity in the building.

The Issues of the Case:

Are defendants liable to plaintiff? Was the crime foreseeable enough to warrant liability?

The Ruling of the Court:

Building owners and managing agents have a common-law duty to take minimal security precautions to protect tenants from the foreseeable criminal acts of third parties.

As one Justice stated for the Second Department in addressing the issue of whether a crime giving rise to a lawsuit was foreseeable to owners and operators of the building in which the crime occurred: A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said there is no requirement that the past experience relied on to establish foreseeability be of criminal activity at the exact location where plaintiff was harmed or that it be of the same type of criminal conduct to which plaintiff was subjected, or that the operative proof must be limited to crimes actually occurring in the specific building where the attack took place. However, this does not mean that the criminal activity relied upon by the plaintiffs to support their claim of foreseeability need not be relevant to predicting the crime in question. Rather, to establish foreseeability, the criminal conduct at issue must be shown to be reasonably predictable based on the prior occurrence of the same or similar criminal activity at a location sufficiently proximate to the subject location.

Defendants met their initial burden of establishing their entitlement to judgment as a matter of law by making a prima facie showing that the sexual assault committed against plaintiff was not reasonably predictable.

In support of defendants’ motion, they submitted the deposition testimony of three witnesses: the plaintiff, an employee of the managing agent and the superintendent of the building. The deposition testimony of these witnesses established nothing more than that, in the words of the employee of the managing agent, there was a lot of drug and drug-related activity in the neighborhood. Moreover, a Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said with respect to the building itself, each witness testified that he or she was not aware of any criminal activity in the building prior to the assault committed against plaintiff.

In opposition to the motion, plaintiff submitted police reports indicating that seven (7) other several criminal activities that had occurred in or near the building prior to the assault. Plaintiff also submitted the affidavit of an expert in the field of premises security who averred, among other things, that the building was in a police precinct with high rates of crime, the drug activity in the neighborhood attracted criminal elements to the neighborhood and the assault on plaintiff was foreseeable.

Upon a review of the records, the court finds that plaintiff's evidence was insufficient to raise a triable issue of fact with respect to whether the sexual assault was foreseeable, i.e., reasonably predictable.

Of the seven prior instances of criminal activity relied upon by plaintiff, only three involved crimes against the person and none are similar to the sexual assault committed against plaintiff.

Thus, the sexual assault committed against plaintiff was not reasonably predictable based on the prior criminal activity in or near the building.

Without trivializing the criminal activity in and around plaintiff's building, it must be acknowledged that, except one, the criminal activity plaintiff relies upon consists of low-level crimes.

When one considers that plaintiff includes all the criminal activity in and around the building over a period of more than 4½ years, it also must be acknowledged that the extent of criminal activity plaintiff relies upon is hardly unusual. Quoting what one Justice said: "As the endless supply of crime statistics attest, crime is a fact of life and is foreseeable. Criminal activity is more frequent in our urban centers, although there are marked differences between neighborhoods. However, the courts have repeatedly held that ambient neighborhood crime alone is insufficient to establish foreseeability".

The fact that a woman entering her apartment in New York City might be subject to a sexual assault is conceivable; but conceivability is not the equivalent of foreseeability.
Accordingly, the motion is granted and the complaint is dismissed.

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An appeal was made by a woman for a gun crime that killed a police officer. The woman and her boyfriend drove to New York City to visit some friends. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said that after the first few nights, the couple settled in at the Hempstead Motor Inn. On the afternoon of Saturday, as the couple drove past a woman's clothing store, the stated that she like the black dress. They entered the boutique, which is located near the intersection, through the front door. The bathroom of the boutique has a window which looks out onto the rear parking area. The window was covered by wooden slats and glass slats. The woman went into the fitting room to try on some clothes, but his boyfriend wasn't in sight when she came out. The sales attendant informed the woman that her boyfriend had asked to use the bathroom. The woman went back to the fitting room and when she again came out, her boyfriend was standing by the front window, front door and he had picked out a blouse for her to try on. Although she didn't buy anything she had seen, she did buy the blouse picked out for her by her boyfriend and they left the store without buying anything.

In her statement given after complete Miranda warnings, the woman said that on the afternoon of the gun crime incident, she and her boyfriend went into Manhattan, where he purchased an ankle holster for his gun; that she remained outside the store while her boyfriend bought it, and she wasn't aware of what he had bought, notwithstanding the fact that she put the bag into her purse. Later, in the early hours of the morning after, the couple decided to get something to eat and the woman changed her clothes. They drove to a bar, when they arrive, her boyfriend told her to stay in the car while he looked for a man. Her boyfriend returned a short time later and they drove around, finally backing into an alleyway and turning out the lights. When the woman asked what he was doing, he allegedly replied not to worry.

The woman stayed in the car to watch for the cops while her boyfriend broke into the back window of the clothing boutique.

After entering the boutique, the man started throwing stuff out the window and yelled to put the stuff in the car. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the woman was putting the clothes which had been thrown out of the window into the trunk when she saw a light go on across the street. While her boyfriend went back into the store, she noticed a pair of headlights in a gas station across the street. The woman left the car and hid behind some trash cans in the alleyway. A police car pulled into the alleyway and a police officer shone a flashlight at her. She then got up and walked over to the police officer, who asked her what she was doing there. She replied that she was looking for her cat. The police then asked for some identification and she presented an address book, but her name was not in it. Before the police officer arrived, the woman had placed, in neat and orderly fashion, ladies' blouses, pants suits, ladies' coats, an adding machine, and a typewriter in the trunk. According to the woman, while she was being questioned, her boyfriend yelled to her to run; she thereafter heard a shot. The officers immediately ran around to the front of the store, with her following behind them, and in the ensuing confusion, she ran away.

The record further makes it clear that what had happened was that the burglary had been interrupted by the police officer who observed a Cadillac in the alleyway behind the row of stores. As the officer pulled into the alleyway, he saw the Cadillac move a little bit. He used his flashlight, but saw no one in the car. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said he did see an open window in the back of the boutique, and requested assistance. At that point a bystander informed the officer that he saw or heard someone banging at the front door of the dress shop. The officer told the bystander to go across the street and yell if he saw anyone run out of the front of the store. At about that time, the officer and his partner spotted the woman behind the Cadillac and near the trash cans in the driveway. She came forward out of the shadows. The officer also observed the open window and a garment lying underneath it. Also at about that time, the officer who was killed pulled up to the front of the store in a police ambulance answering his partner officer’s call for assistance.

During that time, the bystander observed the woman’s boyfriend leave the store and saw the police officer approach him. The woman and her boyfriend’s accounts differ slightly. The bystander observed the police officer place his hand on the man’s shoulder but did not see a gun in the officer’s hands. Suddenly the man turned, faced the officer and shot him. The officer dropped to the ground and the man ran. The other bystander testified that the shooting occurred as the officer attempted to push the man up against the front wall.

Both officers heard a shot and a groan. Both officers ran to the front of the store and the woman fled. An officer who had just arrived gave chase but lost her. The shot officer was taken to the hospital, where he remained until he died.

The woman was arrested in a motel. The police wanted to know the identity and whereabouts of her male accomplice. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the woman said that they had been forced at gunpoint to do the burglary by an unknown White male. She indicated that she would talk without an attorney being present. The woman then repeated the story she had given the arresting officers to the effect that she and her boyfriend had been forced to commit the burglary. The detective replied that the woman was lying; that he had witnesses to show otherwise and that she should tell the truth. The woman then gave the detective an oral statement. She now claimed that she had not known that her boyfriend was armed and that he forced her to participate in the burglary by slapping her. Her oral statement was reduced to writing and signed by her.

While being questioned, the woman identified certain articles recovered at the crime scene, to wit, a bent screwdriver, gloves and a can containing mace, as belonging to her boyfriend. She also admitted that she, too, had possessed mace.

The woman contends that a reversal in the conviction should be made and that the court made a mistake in refusing to charge the jury. The court claimed that they found no error in its main charge to adopt the specific requests to charge. The woman willingly and voluntarily involved herself, and fully participated in a criminal act and by doing that, she necessarily accepted all the consequences of the felony murder committed either during the course of the burglary or during the man’s immediate flight from the crime scene.

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A man was convicted on his guilty plea of marijuana possession in the first degree. His motion to cover up the evidence of marijuana cultivation seized by state police on a search warrant was denied. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the appellate division generally affirmed in a memorandum agreeing with the court's conclusion that the man's act of posting no trespassing signs about every 20 to 30 feet around the perimeter of his property, which consisted of 165 acres of rural, hilly, undeveloped, uncultivated fields and woodlands except for the man's cultivation of marijuana, did not establish an expectation of privacy cognizable under the right to privacy protection of the constitution.

On execution of the search warrant, the state police with assistance of sheriff's department searched the property owned by the man. The application for the warrant included the in camera testimony of a private citizen, who had shot and wounded a deer and followed it onto the man's property. The private citizen observed what appeared to be the remnants of a marijuana growing operation. When the private citizen entered the property again, he testified that he saw approximately 50 marijuana plants under cultivation. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the private citizen reported the information to the state police and gave a leaf that he obtained from one of the plants on the property. Consequently, an investigator accompanied the private citizen to the site where the investigator personally observed the plants. None of the entries of the Investigator or the private citizen was with the man's knowledge or permission.

The warrant application contained tax maps showing that the property belonged to the man and a report of an anonymous telephone tip that the man was growing marijuana on the said property. The court then found that the property was noticeably marked with no trespassing signs which is clearly visible and indeed observed by not only the private citizen but the police units entering the property. The residence consisted of a mobile home with no utilities which located near the road. The marijuana plants were not found within the area around the man's mobile home but some 300-400 yards away.

Apparently attaching significance to the illegality of activities sought to be kept private like growing marijuana, rather than the nature of the efforts to assure privacy, the court held that the man’s expectations of privacy were not legitimate.

The law had recognized the owner's right to prohibit entry on land in the posting provisions of the environmental conservation law and in general obligations law, enacted for the purpose of dissuading landowners from posting their property and encouraging them to admit the public. Despite the arguments, the court did not dismiss so lightly the fact that the police were violating the man's property rights and committing criminal law and civil trespass by entering the land. Significantly, the court in suppressing the evidence has adverted to the illegal conduct of the police in obtaining the evidence through a trespass on private property.

Subsequently, the appellate division vacated the guilty plea of the man and the man’s motion to suppress the evidence is granted. Further, the indictment is also dismissed.

In connection with the abovementioned case of the man, another case related to the unreasonable searches and seizures.

A five-member team from the auto crime division arrived at a vehicle dismantling operation to conduct a random warrantless inspection of the premises. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said that upon their arrival, the members of the team entered the business's front office, where they identified themselves as police officers and announced that they were present to perform an administrative inspection. Upon the officers' request, the owner and operator of the business produced various permits and vehicle dismantler's license. Two of the officers then proceeded to the premises' yard, where they randomly selected vehicle identification numbers from several auto parts. After entering the numbers into a mobile computer located in their patrol car, the officers discovered that two of the parts were from automobiles which had been reported stolen. The owner was then ordered to produce his so-called police book, in which entries relating to the purchase of vehicle parts were required to be recorded. After it was ascertained that the owner’s police book did not contain the required entries pertaining to the stolen parts, the owner was placed under arrest. A detailed search of the premises, subsequently conducted pursuant to a search warrant, revealed some 35 other automobile parts which had also been reported stolen.

Based on records, the Supreme Court held that vehicle and traffic law, which authorizes the police to conduct random warrantless searches of vehicle dismantling businesses to determine whether such businesses are trafficking in stolen automobile parts, and it does not violate the fourth amendment's prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures.

The owner was thereafter charged with multiple counts of criminal possession of stolen property in the third degree. rior to trial, he moved to cover up the physical evidence which had been seized from his vehicle dismantling business. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said in support of his motion, the owner argued that the police violated the prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures contained in article. The court agreed and granted the man's motion to suppress.

On appeal, a divided appellate division reversed the decision. Noting that the Supreme Court had already upheld the legal provisions for warrantless administrative searches of vehicle dismantling businesses against the fourth amendment challenge and the appellate division found no reason to reach a different conclusion under the article of the state constitution.
Based on records, privacy is without question and it is an important constitutional and societal value. However, the nature and scope of the privacy attribute at issue, and the persons or entities entitled or intended to be within the field of the state protection. It should be analyzed in the concrete application and consequences of the peculiar cases. Those are not cases dealing with a general right to privacy and associated right to be left alone. Rather, the fourth amendment cases should be analyzed in their proper analytical framework which consists of the reasonable, legitimate, cognizable expectation of privacy in a traditional criminal jurisprudence context. The court has failed to analyze the privacy right in the proper setting, and that is one of our principal differences with the court's approach.

Further, the legislature has determined that the auto dismantling industry needs close administrative supervision and regulation. The legislative memorandum filed in support of vehicle and traffic law which clearly reflects the objective underlying the ruling that to provide a system of record keeping so that vehicles can be traced through junk yards and to assure that such junk yards are run by legitimate businesses rather than by auto theft rings. Most other legislatures have also judged it necessary to adopt similar law permitting warrantless inspections of the records and inventories of vehicle dismantlers and automobile junkyards .The court today points to no history or tradition of the state creating a peculiar state or local concern warranting extra state privacy protections to such commercial operations, or that vehicle dismantlers in state have historically expected or been accorded greater protection than that afforded by the Supreme Court in previous cases to the rest of the nation.

Apparently, the order was reversed and the case was remitted to the appellate division for further proceedings.

The broad concept of law and lot of opinions from different legislature makes it harder for most people to understand it. Most of us need guidance especially when we are in trouble with the law. The NY Drug Crime Lawyer can provide you a better fight in court. The New York Criminal Attorneys at Stephen Bilkis and Associates can also be your most trusted ally in your court case.

Many people believe that juvenile drug issues are a modern problem. However, history demonstrates that these are problems have been consistent throughout the history of the United States. One case from 1963, demonstrates that juvenile drug dealers were a problem in New York even then.

On July 19, 1963 at around 1830 hours, an off duty juvenile corrections officer was in a location to observe the corner of 14th Street and 31st Avenue in New York, Queens County. He observed a teenager around fifteen years of age at that corner. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the teen appeared intoxicated and walked with an unsteady gait. He watched the boy for a moment and observed a second youth approach him. The second boy put a one-dollar bill on top of a mail collection box. The first boy took the bill off of the box and slipped the other boy something from his hand. The other boy turned and left. The corrections officer did not see what had been in the boy’s hand. He watched the boy turn and go into a corner market. Again, he followed behind. Once inside the store, he kept the boy under surveillance for several minutes.

After a while, he approached the boy and asked him if he could frisk down his outer clothing. The boy complied and the officer felt two pill bottles in the front right pants pocket of his clothing. That was the pocket that the boy had removed whatever he had passed to the other boy from. The boy removed two pill bottles that did not have any labels. The boy told the officer that one of the bottles contained Doriden and the other contained barbiturates. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said that Doriden was a pharmaceutical name for an opiate that was popular in the 1960’s as a mood lifter. The boy voluntarily stated at that point that he had been selling the drugs on the corner when the correctional officer saw him. The correctional officer arrested the boy and he was transported to juvenile detention.

At the time of his hearing, the lab results had not yet returned on the pills in the bottle. The attorney for the defense requested that the charges be dropped since the results that would definitively state what the pills were, would not be available to the court. The court ruled that since the boy had appeared in an intoxicated state and he had voluntarily informed the officer that he was intoxicated as a result of taking the pills, that the court could reasonably assume that the pills in the boy’s possession were drugs. However, the determination of the legitimacy of the search and arrest that recovered the drugs was not as straightforward.

The law states that a police officer may make a warrantless arrest for a misdemeanor that he observes. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the http://criminaldefense.1800nynylaw.com/lawyer-attorney-1406760.htmlcorrectional officer is a peace officer and not a police officer. It is not his usual assignment to make observations and arrest suspects. In this case, he had frisked the boy. Since the boy had voluntarily agreed to the frisk, the frisk was allowable. If the boy had refused, the peace officers lesser standing to a police officer would have prevented the case from going any further. The drugs were secured when the boy voluntarily removed them from his pocket and gave them to the officer. His statement was also voluntary. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said that therefore, the court determined that the search was valid because the boy cooperated voluntarily. The officer was not permitted to arrest the boy unless the crime was a felony if he was acting as a regular citizen.

The court determined that the correctional officer was within his rights to stop the boy, frisk him, recover the evidence and arrest him because the crime had occurred in his presence. Based on the boy’s own statements he is guilty of the offense.

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Prior to January 2005, indeterminate sentencing was considered the norm. It was originally designed as a means of tailoring the sentence to the crime. The belief was that since everyone is an individual, indeterminate sentences allowed a defendant the option of faster improvement. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said it was hoped that the indeterminate sentence would encourage defendants to demonstrate good behavior in an attempt to shorten their overall term of incarceration. The experiment was a dismal failure. Rather than encouraging good behavior, it instilled a feeling of helplessness in the inmate population. The sentences were sometimes completely different for persons involved in the same crime. The disparate sentences that some offenders received soon became regarded as a problem. The violence that some of these offenders demonstrated while incarcerated was also higher than the levels of violence demonstrated by offenders with definitive sentences. The hopelessness of having no way of knowing when the end of their sentences might arrive created an air of hostility and despair in the inmate population. By 2005, the trend of indeterminate sentencing had been recognized as a failure and sentencing reform laws were initiated to correct the problem.

These sentencing reform guidelines had several necessary provisions. They were designed to allow defendants who were charged with non-violent drug offenses to be given determinate sentences that were often much lower than their original indeterminate sentences were. The guidelines state that the person must be a non-violent offender and cannot have committed a violent offense within 10 years of the application for determinate sentencing.

In the present case, the defendant was sentenced to an indeterminate sentence and is attempting to be approved for resentencing under the Drug Law Reform Act to a determinate sentence of three and one half years as a second non-violent felony offender. The original date of his offence was August 26, 2003 and no final adjudication had been made at the time of his request. He states that the revised sentencing guidelines are an amendment of a failed method and because of that, he is entitled to be sentenced under these guidelines as opposed to sentencing under the old ones. His crime was committed prior to the enactment of the new statute.

The prosecutor’s office disagrees. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said they stated that the sentencing guidelines are only applicable to crimes that occurred after January 13, 2005 which is well after the August 2003 date of the defendant’s crimes. The prosecutor states that the new law specifically prohibits any kind of retroactive application to offenses that were committed prior to the enactment of the law.

Currently, the defendant is facing an indeterminate sentence of between four and one half and nine years and twelve and one half to twenty-five years. This is because he has a prior non-violent felony conviction. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said if this request is approved, he could be anticipating a reduction in the sentence to a mere three and one have years and twelve years. The new guidelines would reduce his sentence to only half of what he was originally sentenced.

The Supreme Court agreed with both parties in part. The law does specifically deny any retroactive sentencing based on the enactment date. However, even though the defendant’s crime was committed before the enactment of the law, his case is still actively pending in the court. That means that according to the view of the Supreme Court Justices, this case is still active after the date of the enactment of the new sentencing guidelines and the defendant is allowed to be sentenced under the new guidelines. The defendant’s motion to be sentenced under the new guidelines is approved by the court. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said that often something as simple as a delay in a sentencing date can mean the difference of more than twenty years of time spent behind bars. A good attorney can help you if you find yourself in a situation like this one.

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In 1988, a man and his friend along with their two wives were running a drug enterprise out of a one room apartment with an attached kitchen located on 88th street in Queens, New York. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said an undercover police officers had been focused on this apartment for several weeks. In fact, they had conducted undercover narcotics purchases on three separate occasions.

They were made on September 13, September 20, and September 29. After making all of these purchases, the police officers were able to obtain a search warrant to search the residence. After making the purchase on the 29th, the officers executed the search warrant on the residence. They uncovered several tinfoil packets of cocaine and angel dust. One packet of cocaine was located on the floor in between the couch and the wall. It was about a four or five inch space between the wall and the sofa. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer reported that six dollars was located in a closet that had cocaine residue on it. In another closet officers recovered $110 which was the money that was marked by them as the money that they had used to purchase narcotics at that location. The $110 was mixed in with another $850 in cash that was hidden in a child-sized purse. In the last closet, they located $3,630 in cash.

All four of the defendants were present when the search warrant was executed. They were all charged with possessing a narcotic with the intent to sell it. It is legal practice to charge everyone in a room with the possession of a narcotic that is in the room since all of the people are found to have knowledge of or should reasonably have known that the drugs were there. The drugs do not necessarily have to be in plain view. The drugs can be in a container or other item that is accessible to any of the occupants of the room. The narcotics can be in a completely separate room if they are visible to the occupants of a different room. In this case, the narcotics that were in the room, was the one packet that was located between the sofa and wall. a Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the court ruled that that particular packet could not be deemed as accessible to everyone in the room or that all of the occupants of the room would have known that it was there. The fact that it was not in open view or in a container in open view makes it impossible for the police to assume that anyone other than the one owner could possibly have known that it was there. When it is determined that narcotics or other illegal drugs are in open view and in close proximity to persons, it is referred to as the drug factory presumption of Penal Law §220.25 (2).

The trial court in this case chose to relax the standards on allowing the presumption on the basis of the packet of drugs behind the sofa. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the trial court erred according to the Supreme Court. Without the packet of drugs that were discovered behind the sofa, there was no legal application to the drug factory presumption. This is in spite of the fact that several purchases of narcotics were made on different dates by undercover officers. The fact that the jury was directed to include this information in consideration by using the drug factory presumption was an error that cannot be ignored. There is no way for the Appellate Division to determine that the jury was not swayed in their decision by applying the drug factory presumption. It is for that reason that the case was overturned and returned to the courts for retrial without any implication of the drug factory presumption.

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The plaintiffs and appellants in the case are Lois White et al. The defendants and appellees in the case are the Scrivner Corporation et al. The case is being heard in the fifth circuit of the United States Court of Appeals.

Case History

A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said one night Lois and her daughter Sandra White, along with her sister Gloria Pratt, went shopping at a food store owned by Scrivner Corporation, the assistant manager of the shop accused Lois of taking a roast out of the meat department of the store. The assistant manager requested that Lois and her daughter and sister come with him to an area located at the rear of the store. He asked for permission to search through their purses and while looking through the women’s purses he found a pistol located in Lois Whites purse. He told the women to stand by the wall and he made a call to the police department. The police arrived and arrested White for having a weapon that was concealed. The food goods that White was accused of stealing were never found.

Lois White and her sister and daughter filed a suit against the Scrivner Corporation and their employees stating that the search and detention infringed upon their fourteenth amendment rights. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the case was tried in front of a district court and there was not a jury present. The judge found in favor of the defendants and ruled that no rights were violated. This is the verdict that is being appealed in court today.

Case Discussion and Conclusion

In order to make a claim under the United States Constitution 42, the plaintiffs must prove that the defendants were acting under the color of the state laws and deprived them of a right that is preserved by the Constitution. The plaintiffs have offered three arguments to meet this requirement. First, the plaintiffs argue that by detaining them and searching through their belongings the employees were performing an act that is reserved specifically for the state. Second, the plaintiff’s state that the act should be found as the defendants acted under a statute made by the state that allows suspected shoplifters to be detained. Finally, the plaintiffs argue that the state action is part of this case because the defendants acted with the police in order to seize and search their property and to detain them.

The defendants searching the women’s purses cannot be characterized as functions that are reserved only for the state. While it is true that most of the time these actions are performed by the police, it is not uncommon for the shop owner to search someone who is expected of shoplifting. This is to attempt to discover whether or not goods have been stolen before contacting the police. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said when the gun was found, detaining the individuals was not unacceptable. It is quite common for a private citizen to intervene when they feel that a crime is being committed.

A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the arguments of the plaintiffs fail to show the defendants acted under the color of the law. These arguments are not backed by significant evidence to prove these facts. For this reason, we affirm the original ruling in the case in favor of the defendants. All counts in the case are dismissed and there is no recovery for damages given to the plaintiffs.

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The plaintiff and appellee in the case is the United States of America. The defendant and appellant of the case is Alexander Antoine Christopher. The case is being heard in the Eleventh Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals.

Appeal

A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the defendant, Alexander Antoine Christopher is appealing the district court’s sentencing of 77 months for illegally reentering the country and violating 18 of the United States Constitution. The issue he is raising on appeal is he feels there was an error made by the district court when they enhanced his criminal record score by 16. He states that his prior conviction of theft does not qualify as an aggravated felony.

Case History

The Immigration and Naturalization Service agents discovered in 1999, that Christopher was being held by the Clayton County Detention Center on a probation violation. The Immigration and Naturalization Service discovered that Christopher had been born in Bermuda and that he entered the U.S. through Miami, Florida. It was discovered that he had been arrested on five different occasions in Georgia for driving while intoxicated. He was charged with a felony offense in 1994 for being a habitual violator. He was voluntary deported from the United States in 1995. He then reentered the United States a short time later.

In the year 1997, Christopher was convicted of shoplifting and obstructing an officer, both misdemeanor offenses. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said he was sentenced to 12 months in prison for each of these crimes. After this conviction he was deported again. Christopher reentered the country again, without the necessary consent of the Attorney General. This is a violation of the United States Constitution, 8. He was charged on this violation and sentenced to 77 months in prison. When determining his sentence for this offense, the court added 16 to his base offense level based on his prior conviction of shoplifting, which was determined to be an aggravated felony.

Case Discussion

Christopher argues that the shoplifting charge is not considered an aggravated felony by definition. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said he argues that the term of imprisonment for a shoplifting charge is at the most a year and not at least a year. He also states that the language of the law defining sentencing is applicable to only crimes that are obviously felonies by their very nature.

We find that the intent of the statute is stated to include a crime that has a penalty of at least a year of imprisonment. While in this case the maximum sentence is up to a year, we feel it still qualifies to be determined as an aggravated assault based on the language of the law. Even though his sentence in the case was suspended, that is irrelevant in this particular case for appeal.

Case Result

The argument made by the defendant and appellant, Christopher is that the shoplifting charge should not be considered an aggravated felony. However, we have concluded that the statute in the state laws defines an aggravated felony as any offense that has a term of imprisonment that is at least a year. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the shoplifting violation qualifies under this reasoning.

The court finds in favor of the plaintiff and the initial sentencing stands. The addition of 16 points to Christopher’s base offense level was fair and is hereby affirmed.

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Whenever a child is involved or present at the time that a criminal act is committed, it becomes more serious. Child endangerment charges are especially applicable in cases where there has been a drug crime committed. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said sometimes, the case is as mundane as an aunt or uncle who brings marijuana into the home where children are located. The children need never see the drugs for the aunt or uncle to be charged with child abuse or child endangerment. If there is even a possibility, no matter how remote, that the child may be able to obtain the drug and ingest it, the person who brought it in to the home will be charged.

Most people think that in order to be charged with child endangerment or abuse, that they have to use the drug in front of the child. Some even think that they have to provide the drug to the child. Neither one of these situations is accurate. The mere presence of the drug in the home constitutes a drug crime. That drug crime can constitute child neglect or abuse depending on the circumstance.

A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said on one such case, a woman was arrested for endangering the welfare of a child as well as possession of cocaine. The incident that led to the woman’s arrest occurred when a police officer was in her apartment legally in reference to a different situation. While he was in the apartment, he observed a glassine bag on top of the defendant’s refrigerator that in his experience as a law enforcement officer appeared to be cocaine. The woman later admitted that it was cocaine and that she was a person who would use cocaine every now and then.

The officer also observed a small female child in the apartment living room. The girl was about two to three feet tall and about 40 pounds. The woman stated that the child was her granddaughter. The defendant maintains that the child could not have obtained the cocaine because it was on top of the refrigerator and was therefore out of her reach. The state maintains that simply putting a hazardous substance out of a child’s reach will not necessarily protect them from obtaining it.

The state set forth several scenarios in which the baggie could fall or be blown off of the top of the refrigerator. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said that would put it in the reach of the child who could ingest the material. Such a young child could easily die from ingesting cocaine. The state also maintains that the child can walk and climb. A child of that age would certainly be able to climb up onto a kitchen counter to reach the top of the refrigerator. Children of this age are known to be climbers and getting up on the kitchen counter is not unusual for any child that age. They are accustomed to having to climb up onto the counters in order to reach a cup, cereal, or other daily items. A child could reasonably decide to investigate the substance in the bag on top of the refrigerator. There was great emphasis placed on the fact that the drugs were not locked up or secured away from the child in any way. The woman was tried by a jury and convicted.

The defendant disagreed with her conviction and applied for an appeal. The justices who heard the appeal determined that the state had made an excellent case for the fact that the child could have obtained the drugs. Merely placing them on top of the refrigerator did not secure them from the curiosity of a child. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the most appropriate thing that the grandmother could have done would have been not to bring the drugs into the apartment in the first place. However, since she did take the drugs into the apartment, she should have taken steps to ensure the safety of the child by placing them somewhere that they could be locked up away from the child. It is important that anyone who has been arrested for drug offenses contact a Queens Drug Lawyer. A Queens Criminal Lawyer can represent your interests and help you regain your freedom.

The plaintiff and appellee in the case is the United States of America. The defendant and appellant of the case is Norman L. Haymer. The case is being heard in the fifth circuit of the United States Court of Appeals.

Appeal

A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the defendant and appellant in the case, Norman L. Haymer, is appealing his original sentence. He states his right to counsel as provided by the sixth amendment was violated as a misdemeanor conviction that was uncounseled was included when determining his criminal history score.

Previous Case

Previously, Haymer had submitted a plea of guilty to a charge of possession of cocaine with the intent to sell. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the probation officer who issued the presentence report recommended that Haymer be sentenced to anywhere from 53 to 63 months. He based this calculation on a 22 offense level and a category III criminal history. The score included 2 points for committing a crime while on probation, a point for a conviction that occurred in 1987, and a point for a charge of shoplifting in 1991. It is the shoplifting charge that is currently being appealed.

The records of the shoplifting case indicate that Haymer was arrested on the 22nd of May in 1991 and entered a guilty plea. He was fined $300 plus the cost of court. Haymer was later arrested for contempt of court because he failed to pay the court costs and fine. However, the defendant states that he performed 18 days of work at a Hinds County Penal Farm as opposed to paying the charges.

Haymer did not file any written objections to the presentence report, but he objected during his sentencing hearing about the shoplifting charge being included. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said his reasoning was that he was not represented by a lawyer at the time of the conviction. If the shoplifting charge is excluded his score would be lowered and the result would be a lower sentence time of a maximum 57 months instead of a maximum 63 months.

Defendant Argument

The defendant states that at the time of the shoplifting incident he was working and took a pack of cigarettes. He was arrested at the time and paid bond to be released. During his court date he told the judge that he did not take the cigarettes. He states that he was in the judge’s chamber and assumed that if he pleads guilty to the charges he would receive a low fine. However, the fine was $300, which I could not afford. This lead to me being arrested and put in jail to work the fine off. I was never told that I had the right to a lawyer and if I was given the choice I would have chosen to obtain a lawyer.

Court Ruling

A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the court finds that because there was no term of imprisonment involved in his shoplifting sentencing, the uncounseled prosecution of the time is not unconstitutional. For the purpose of this particular case the court finds that including the conviction for shoplifting when determining his criminal history score. While Haymer may have served time for the conviction, it was not part of the initial judgment. Regardless of the previous conviction or fine for the shoplifting crime, it is not considered unconstitutional. Additionally, the result of incarceration for the crime was not used to determine the score, but rather the fact that he was previously arrested for the charge.

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At approximately 8:00 p.m., a man obtained a ride going to a shopping center. Ten minutes later, he entered a delicatessen, showed a gun and demanded money from the clerk. The clerk then turned over about $145 in cash and checks. After the robbery, the man left the shopping center and walked through the surrounding neighborhood. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the man eventually arrived at the county line bowling alley. Meanwhile, the robbery had been reported to the police department and an alert was transmitted over the police radio. Consequently, two officers arrived at the delicatessen just minutes after the man had left. A description of the robber was attained and reported over the police radio. A normal police procedure require that unassigned patrol cars proceed to the vicinity of the crime area and any nearby major intersections in an effort to seal off potential avenues of escape. As the man walked onto the parking lot of the bowling alley, he saw a police car turn and enter the lot. The man hid under a parked car. The lone officer in the car come out from his vehicle and walked over to man's hiding place. The man got up from underneath the car with his gun concealed between his legs. The officer ordered the man to put his weapon on the car hood but the man turned and fired. The officer was mortally wounded and struggled to get back to his police car. The officer then attempted to use the radio to call for the assistance of brother officers and then collapsed on the seat. The man took the automobile of a bowling alley patron and fled. An off-duty police officer used the patrolman's radio to broadcast a signal for help and the report of the shooting went over the police radio at 8:24 p.m. The eyewitnesses fixed the time of the argument at approximately 8:25 p.m. The bowling alley was located less than one-half mile from the robbed delicatessen.

The man was subsequently captured, identified by eyewitnesses and indicted. A motion to suppress his confession was denied, as was a motion to suppress evidence of a pretrial, police station lineup.

After a jury proceeding, the man was convicted of manslaughter, felony murder, robbery and grand larceny. The appellate division generally affirmed the judgment of conviction, without opinion. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the principal issue on that appeal is whether the jury was properly permitted to conclude that the shooting of the patrolman occurred in the immediate flight from the delicatessen robbery.

Based on records, a felony murder is committed when a person, acting alone or in concert with others, commits or attempts to commit one of nine predicate felonies, of which robbery is one, and in the course of and in furtherance of such crime or of immediate flight there from, or another participant causes the death of a person other than one of the participants. By law, the intent necessary to sustain a murder conviction is conditional from the intent to commit a specific, serious, felonious act, even though the accused, in truth, may not have intended to kill.
The jury at trial and its verdict found that the man did not possess a murderous intent. The question then arises in whether the jury properly found that the killing of the patrolman was in the immediate area from the robbery, therefore triggering the application of the felony murder principle. In resolving the issue, it is first necessary to refer to the checkered case law in the state, applying the felony murder concepts to cases, such as the said case, where the fatal wounds were inflicted in the course of escape.

Based on records, the 1967 Penal Law is limited to the application of the felony murder concept to nine serious and violent predicate felonies. At the same time, a Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said it was provided that the doctrine would apply to a killing committed in immediate flight. The change was intended to do away with many of the old technical distinctions relating to abandonment or completion.

Further, under the new formulation, the issue of whether the homicide occurred in immediate flight from a felony is only rarely to be considered as a question of law for resolution by the court. Only where the record requires the inference that the person was not in immediate flight and a murder conviction be set aside on the law. Significantly, the question is to be submitted to the jury, under an appropriate charge. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the jury should be instructed to give consideration to whether the homicide and the felony occurred at the same location or, if not, to the distance separating the two locations. The weight may also be placed on whether there is an interval of time between the commission of the felony and the commission of the homicide .The jury may properly consider such additional factors as whether the offender had possession of the fruits of criminal activity, whether the police, watchmen or concerned citizens were in close chase, and whether the offender had reached a place of temporary safety. These factors are not exclusive and others may be appropriate in differing factual settings. If anything, past history demonstrates the fruitlessness of attempting to apply rigid rules to virtually limitless factual variations. No single factor is necessarily controlling. It is the combination of several factors that leads to a justifiable conclusion.

In the case, the jury properly finds, as a question of fact that the killing of the patrolman occurred in immediate flight from the delicatessen robbery. The shooting occurred less than 15 minutes after the robbery and less than a half mile away. The man had made off with cash proceeds and was attempting to secure his possession of the robbery. The police had reason to believe that the robber was still in the immediate vicinity and had taken steps to seal off avenues of escape. With regards to the absence of proof as to why the officer turned into the bowling alley parking lot has no deficiency. The standard is not whether the police officer subjectively believed that the man was the robber. Indeed, the man's own anxiety may be more valuable. The man's response to the observation of the police car was to seek an immediate hiding place. And, it indicates that the man perceived that the police were on his trail. The record does not indicate that the officer knew that the man committed a crime and it does indicate that the man feared that the officer possessed such knowledge. Additionally, the man had not reached any place of temporary safety. In short, there is evidence from which the jury could conclude, as it did, that the man was in immediate flight from the robbery and that he shot the officer in order to make a good escape. The jury was properly charged as to the relevant considerations and the court sees no basis for disturbing its findings.

As to the man's contention that he was deprived of a right to counsel at the lineup, the previous decision in court established that there is no absolute right to counsel at a prearraignment lineup. The other claims of the man, that the lineup was suggestive and that physical evidence was improperly received at the trial, are without merit.

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The plaintiff and appellant of the case is Sharon McNulty. The defendants and appellees in the case are J.C. Penney #2168, J.C. Penney Corporation, J.C. Penney Company, Eric Green, and John Doe Defendants. The case is being heard in the fifth circuit of the United States Court of Appeals.

Appeal

Sharon McNulty, the appellant is challenging the original grant of a summary judgment made by the district court. McNulty was arrested at a J.C. Penney store located in Ridgeland, Mississippi after she had been accused of shoplifting on the 25th of March in 2005.

Original Case and Background

Sharon McNulty is female and African American. She states to be disabled. While she was shopping on the 25th of March at the Northpark Mall located in the city of Ridgeland in Mississippi, she entered the department store of J.C. Penney’s. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said when she entered the store she already had shopping bags from Dillard’s and McRae’s, where she had previously been shopping.

While visiting J.C. Penney’s, an associate became suspicious of her and stated that he had seen her enter the fitting rooms repeatedly with merchandise. Eric Greene was working as the security guard at the time. He viewed a security camera and watched McNulty choose a number of different items and place them in her cart. She was observed for over 30 minutes. She continued to gather items and place them on top of her bags that were already in the cart. She paid for the items, but a brassiere that was attached to the front of her cart was not paid for. During his statement Greene said that McNulty acted suspiciously during her time at the store and then left. When she exited the store she was stopped and taken to the security office. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said she was kept in the office until a police officer arrived.

During her time in detainment McNulty became very upset and claims that a number of ailments were developed, including stress related blindness that was temporary.

A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said Sharon McNulty was found not guilty on this charge of shoplifting and proceeded with a lawsuit that was moved to a federal court and accused Eric Greene, an employee of J.C. Penney, and the company J.C. Penney of false imprisonment, assault, battery, malicious prosecution, defamation, negligence, invasion of her privacy, discrimination based on her disability, discrimination due to race, discrimination that was gender based, and discrimination based on her religion.

Case Discussion and Case Ruling

On the 25th of March the district court dismissed the claims of intentional torts as the one year statute of limitations as stated by the laws of Mississippi. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said she is not challenging this order.

The remaining claims including negligence, and unlawful arrest were all dismissed through a summary judgment that was granted in favor of the appellees on the 23rd of May, 2008.

After reading through the evidence that has been provided, we have found no proof in regards to the claims made by McNulty. For this reason, we affirm the decision that was made by the district court and the motion for summary judgment is upheld.

We offer free consultations to anyone that finds themselves in need of legal advice, whether you have been charged with shoplifting, a drug crime or sex crime. With offices located throughout the city of New York, Stephen Bilkis & Associates makes it easy to set up an appointment at a time that suits your needs. If you need help through any type of legal matter let our experts walk you through each step along the way.

Plaintiff and defendant are brothers. The parties have been estranged since an event which occurred on Mother's Day in 2003 at a family gathering. There have been numerous Family Court matters involving this family.

The allegations:
For the First Cause of Action - A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the defendant has falsely accused plaintiff of a serious crime, namely filing a false police report, a criminal violation of New York State Penal Law. That accusation by defendant was a false and defamatory statement of and concerning plaintiff; specifically that she had filed a false criminal complaint against him for threatening her by brandishing a gun. Defendant made this false accusation to third parties, including but not necessarily limited to, family members.
For the Second Cause of Action - Defendant has falsely accused plaintiff of being the subject of a protective order regarding defendant’s children. That false accusation disparaged plaintiff in her trade, business, and/or professional reputation as an educational professional who works with children. That allegation by defendant was a false and defamatory statement of and concerning plaintiff, specifically and falsely suggesting that plaintiff personally had engaged in improper behavior relative to defendant’s children. Defendant made this false accusation to third parties, including, but not necessarily limited to, plaintiff’s supervisor.

For the Third Cause of Action - Defendant’s harassing conduct toward plaintiff and her family was extreme and outrageous. Defendant intentionally or recklessly engaged in that harassment as part of his continual emotional assault on his sister, the plaintiff. As a result of this extreme and outrageous, intentional conduct, a New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the plaintiff suffered severe emotional distress.

The defendant has moved for a motion for summary judgment.

The Court’s Ruling:

Under the law, a party is entitled to summary judgment when it is apparent that there are no issues in factual dispute which require a trial. Courts have held that this remedy should only be granted where there are no triable issues of fact. Issue-finding, rather than issue-determination is the key to the summary judgment procedure.

In order to prevail on a motion for summary judgment, a Nassau Couny Drug Possession Lawyer said the movant must present a prima facie case demonstrating entitlement to judgment as a matter of law due to an absence of any material issues of fact. Once the movant has established its prima facie case entitling it to summary judgment as a matter of law, the party opposing a motion for summary judgment must produce evidentiary proof sufficient to require a trial of material questions of fact.

First – The law provides that a person is guilty of offering a false instrument for filing in the second degree when, knowing that a written instrument contains a false statement or false information, he offers or presents it to a public office or servant with knowledge or belief that it will be filed with, registered or recorded in or otherwise become a part of the records of such public office or public servant. Offering a false instrument for filing in the second degree is a class A misdemeanor.
Here, a Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the plaintiff has pointed to a specific section of the penal law as she argues the defendant is guilty of slander per se, however, the section pointed to in the papers is simply a misdemeanor. It is not a serious crime or an indictable offense.
Accordingly, the first allegation regarding the defendant accusing the plaintiff of filing a false police report is not slander per se and as such is dismissed pursuant to the rules.

Second - It is important to note that, by definition, defamation is a false statement that exposes a person to public contempt, ridicule, aversion or disgrace.

Here, record reveals that the statements provided in the (amended) complaint are cryptic at best and offer no insight as to who they were said to or what the specific language was. Plaintiff has failed to allege a particular person or persons to whom the alleged statement regarding the order of protection was made. Such a failure warrants dismissal.

As was the case with the original complaint, which was the subject of a motion to dismiss and further Appellate Division Second Department action, the statements currently pled regarding the second allegation are subject to dismissal for failing to abide by the mandate of the rules which requires that the defamatory statements be delineated in haec verba. An allegation of defamation which fails to comply with CPLR special pleading requirement that the complaint set forth the particular words complained of mandates dismissal.

The amended complaint simply states "Defendant accused plaintiff of being the subject of a protective order regarding defendant’s children". Such statement is not specific enough to support a finding of slander per se.

In fact, it is true that there were many orders of protection between members of the subject family and it is also true that the incessant fighting between these parties started regarding something that had happened to one of the defendants children at a family party.

In addition, members of this family at one time had a number of dockets in the Family Court and a number temporary orders of protection were issued as a result of those Family Court matters.
Therefore, it is impossible for the court to discern what was meant by the statement that plaintiff is the subject of a protective order. The statement as offered by the plaintiff could in fact mean that she was the protected party that the order of protection was issued in favor of and, in fact, she was the protected party in a Temporary Order of Protection issued under a Family Court Index Number.
Given the lengthy Family Court history involving members of this family this court is left unable to conclude that the statement as offered constitutes slander per se. As such, the statement appears to be subject to various interpretations and is not nearly onerous enough to rise to the level necessary to support a claim for slander per se.

Third - The court is left to deal with the only remaining claim which involves an allegation of "intentional infliction of emotional distress". Initially, it is worth noting that the plaintiff has repeatedly sued the defendants in multiple case before multiple courts in this county. More importantly, the matter in Family Court where the plaintiff filed a family offense petition against one of the defendants under Article 8 of the Family Court Act resulted in finding that no family offense had occurred after a trial before a Family Court judge.

In order to recover under a claim of intention infliction of emotional distress the plaintiff must prove four elements: (1) extreme and outrageous conduct; (2) intent to cause, or disregard of a substantial probability of causing, severe emotional distress; (3) a causal connection between the conduct and injury; and (4) severe emotional distress.

Here, the "bare bones" allegations before the court regarding intentional infliction of emotional distress fall well below the standard necessary to successfully bring such a claim. The complaint gives no details or facts as to what behaviors are being complained of; rather, the plaintiff uses mere conclusory allegations such as “the conduct was extreme and outrageous" and "defendant intentionally or recklessly engaged in that harassment as part of his continued emotional assault on his sister". These statements, even if true, are insufficient to succeed on an allegation of intentional infliction of emotional distress.

In order to state a claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress, conduct must be alleged which is so outrageous in character, and so extreme in degree, as to go beyond all possible bounds of decency, and to be regarded as atrocious, and utterly intolerable in a civilized community. The law does not compensate for "threats, annoyances or petty oppressions or other trivial incidents which must necessarily be expected and are incidental to modern life no matter how upsetting.
Clearly, the plaintiff has not alleged any facts which demonstrate extreme and outrageous conduct on the part of the defendant.

Accordingly, the final action in the amended complaint is dismissed.

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New York is in the process of correcting a situation that involved handing out indeterminate sentences to drug offenders. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the 2004 Drug Law Reform Act and the Drug Law Reform Act of 2009 are efforts to correct some of the issues that have plagued the fair sentencing of drug crime offenders in New York. Political agendas and ill-advised legislators, decided that indeterminate sentencing would reduce crime and make them look tough on criminals. What it created instead was an overcrowding of the prison system with offenders who had no idea if they would be incarcerated for a day or ten years. That instability in their situations caused undue stress on the inmates and increased violence in the system. The indeterminate sentencing system was also found to be unfair. Two people would be arrested at the same time and one would get probation and the other might get an indeterminate sentence not to exceed ten years. These were much harsher sentences than even some violent offenders were receiving. Studies were conducted that revealed many more serious results of indeterminate sentences on inmates and the system. In fact, one of the most memorable studies demonstrated that female inmates were twice as likely to be given an indeterminate sentence as their male counterparts were. That was true even if they were arrested at the same time for the same offense. The political get tough on drug crime agenda was back firing on the politicians who drove the movement. They were forced to rethink their program.

Under modern sentencing guidelines, a New York Drug Possession Lawyer said these same criminals were getting less prison time and more alternative sentences like house arrest, half-way houses, and mandatory drug treatment. All of which relieve overcrowding in the prison system while supervising non-violent drug offenders at their own expense. The Drug Law Reform Act enabled people who were convicted of a Class B felony drug crime to apply to the courts for resentencing of their indeterminate sentences. The requirements for the program are that they must have an indeterminate sentence exceeding three years. They must not have committed a violent felony offense within ten years of the time that they make the application to have their case reevaluated. The ten-year look back rule does not start at the time of their offense, or at the time of their conviction. The clock starts at the time that they submit their request. It does not include any time that they were incarcerated for other offenses during that ten-year period. So if an inmate applied for resentencing in 2010. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said his sentence was indeterminate not to exceed 20 years. He was convicted in 2008 of a Class B felony drug crime. He committed a violent felony in 2000. He spent five years in prison as a result. That would mean that his violent felony conviction of 2008 adds five years to the ten years. In this example, he would not be exempt, even though his conviction was in 2000 and his request was in 2010, because of the five years in prison, he would have to have no violent crimes in his history going back to 1995. In this case, he would not qualify.

In one case, a Queens woman was convicted of criminal sale of a controlled substance in the third degree, a jury found her guilty and imposed an indeterminate sentence in July of 2001. In April of 2010 she applied for resentencing. She was granted her request. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the District Attorney filed an appeal to the Supreme Court based on the fact that the resentence was invalid as a matter of law. When the court granted the woman’s request for resentencing, they failed to add on the time that she had been incarcerated on other offenses during the ten year period. That additional time that was added on puts her back to a violent offense that she committed in 1999 which was an offense that excludes her from being eligible for resentencing. The Supreme Court reversed her approval and returned her original sentence that she was serving prior to her request.

It is important that the people who have been arrested for drug offenses contact a Queens Drug Lawyer. A Queens Criminal Lawyer can represent your interests and help you regain your freedom.

Around 1985, a detective in plain-clothes and an unmarked car was working a known drug area in Queens when he and his partner saw a transaction that they believed was drug related. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said they saw one man approach another and hand him money. The other man produced a three by five inch brown envelope and the first man took it in exchange for the money. The officers believed that it was a drug transaction based on the fact that the bags were the size, shape, and description of units called, “three dollar bags” that are often used for drug crimes.

The two officers got out of their car and approached the two men. They identified themselves as police and the two men took flight. A short foot chase ensued in which the defendant threw his hat off and then threw something black into some bushes. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said one officer retrieved the two items, at which time he discovered that the black item was a handgun. The defendant stopped running and was taken into custody and placed under arrest. Upon checking the operability of the weapon, it was discovered that it was a fully loaded nine-millimeter pistol that was also functional.

The defendant was convicted of drug crime and criminal possession of a weapon. He promptly filed an appeal. His claim is that the officer’s initial stop was investigatory. As such, the officers would have to show reasonable suspicion that a crime is, had, or was about to be committed and that the defendant was one of them. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said that he contends that the mere passing of an envelope from one person to another on a public street was no implication of a criminal enterprise. He also stated that when he ran, they had no right to chase him because he was only exercising his constitutional right to leave without answering questions.

The justices contend that the officers were well within their rights because they observed conduct that they were able to articulate to the court, based on their experience, and training as police officers, led them to believe that a crime had been committed and that the defendant was involved in a substantial manner. The justices felt that any ordinary police officer, given the same facts and circumstances would come to the same conclusion. Therefore, the stop was justified.

The defendant claimed that the level of police intrusion was too severe for the circumstances. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said that he should have the right to hand some money to an acquaintance on the side of the road without being intruded upon by police officers. The justices disagreed again. At the point where a person recognizes a police officer as a law enforcement officer, and then takes flight upon seeing him, he has behaved in a manner that is not within the norm of society. The level of police intrusion was appropriate given the circumstances. One of the deciding factors in the voracity of the encounter was that the incident occurred in a known drug area. The encounter would have been more difficult to justify to the court if the incident had occurred in a business area in the middle of the day. At that point, the exchange of a manila envelope for cash would not logically have ben assumable as a drug transaction. It could be business papers. The location of the incident and the time of day create a different picture of what was transpiring between the two men. There is no doubt that when the officers first exited the car, they had an intention to find out more information. When the defendant took flight upon their approach gives objective reason to support the intrusion of privacy that was necessary by the police officers.

At Stephen Bilkis & Associates Queens Criminal Lawyers are available to help you in convenient offices throughout New York and the Metropolitan area. Your freedom is our concern. Our Queens Drug Lawyers are trained to provide you with the best defense possible.

Whenever evidence of a crime is discovered by police during an inventory search of a person’s vehicle, it is subject to scrutiny. Inventory searches are administrative searches. That means that the police department or agency maintains documents in their standard operating procedures manual that indicates that an inventory of an arrested person’s vehicle will be performed incident to that arrest. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the reason for inventory searches is that people often make allegations that items are missing from their vehicles. The inventory of the person’s vehicle incident to their arrest is to determine what exactly is in the vehicle. Anything that appears to be valuable needs to be removed and placed into evidence or property so that the person can re-claim their valuables upon getting out of jail. The police department is protected from allegations of theft, and all valuables are protected for the individual.

However, in many cases, illegal items, narcotics, open alcoholic beverage container, stolen credit cards, and other items are located during the inventory of a vehicle. It is at that point that the officer must be able to prove that the search was an administrative search and not a search for contraband. That is why it is important for police officers to have their procedures documented.

A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said that in a case that was decided before the Supreme Court of New York County on November 18, 2009, a defendant who was charged with one count of Criminal Possession of a Weapon in the second degree and with driving under the influence of alcohol. The man was arrested following a traffic stop. The officer stated that he observed a Lexus pulled up to a fire hydrant. There was a white male behind the wheel of the car. When the officer pulled up, the man got out of the car and approached the officer. The officer stated that the man’s eyes were glassy and bloodshot, he exuded a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage from about his person, and he was unsteady on his feet.

He was asked to take field sobriety tests and he refused. He was arrested for DUI. He also refused the breathalyzer test at the precinct where his car was inventoried. During the course of conducting the inventory search of the car, the defendant’s sister arrived at the precinct. She introduced herself to the officers. She identified herself as a Metropolitan Transit Police Officer and noticed that she had graduated from the police academy with the arresting officer in the case.

She accompanied him out to the car and he released many of the defendant’s personal items into her custody. While conducting the inventory, he moved to inventory the trunk. When he opened the trunk, he observed a closed bag. When he looked inside the bag, he located a firearm. The defendant was notified of the additional charge.

In court, the defendant maintained that the gun was the fruit of the poisonous tree under the Exclusionary Rule. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the Exclusionary Rule states that any evidence of any crime that is obtained pursuant to an illegal search is inadmissible in court as evidence unless the police can show that they would have inevitably discovered the evidence anyway.

In this situation, the defendant claimed that he was not driving the car. He stated that he was already outside the car when the officer arrived. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said this would have made an impound of the vehicle pursuant to an arrest invalid and any proceeds from that search would have been illegal.

The court found that the search was within the guidelines set forth in the procedure manual and thus the search was upheld and the gun was ruled as valid evidence. Stephen Bilkis & Associates have Criminal Lawyers who can fight for you. Their New York DUI Lawyers are familiar with handling cases in criminal courts where the Exclusionary Rule is an issue. Many items can fall into the category of illegal searches when the case is DWI. At Stephen Bilkis & Associates, we have offices throughout New York and the Metropolitan area. Being able to defend the client’s interest is of the utmost importance to us.

On April 14, 1972, a New York Drug Crime Lawyer said a reputed bookmaker and his wife and sister-in-law were at home relaxing. Two masked men forced their way into the home in Huntington, Suffolk County. After ransacking the house and stealing any valuables that were on hand, the men shot the bookmaker in the head. His wife was also shot and suffered from memory loss due to a stroke. She was never able to remember that night so she was unable to assist law enforcement in the investigation.

A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said then, in December of that year, the investigators were informed that a nineteen-year-old woman and her boyfriend/employer had information about the murder. The two had been arrested in reference to an unrelated kidnapping. Detectives were sent to interview the woman since they had not had any leads and the case had grown stale. She related that the night of the murder, she had been at her boyfriend’s house. She stated that she heard a heated discussion in reference to a crime, so she pretended to be asleep. What she stated that she overheard was a conversation between the defendant, his brother-in-law, another man, and her boyfriend about the murder. She heard the one man tell her boyfriend that he had shot the bookmaker. The defendant stated that he had shot the bookmaker’s wife. Her boyfriend talked about remaining in the car outside and how he had told the other two to only rob them and not to shoot anybody. The woman also stated that although her boyfriend had told her just the day before that he did not have any money, he gave her $25 the day after the murder. He had also told her several days before that he was going to rip off a bookie.

Within days of being interviewed by the detectives, she went to the office of the District Attorney in Queens, New York and began plea negotiations on the kidnapping indictment. The woman committed suicide before she was called to the stand to testify on the murder case. The detective was allowed to testify to the information that she had given him at trial as a declaration against her penal and pecuniary interest. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said her mother was also allowed to testify to conversations that she had with her daughter before her daughter’s death. She stated that she had asked her daughter for some money. Her daughter had told her that she could not afford to give her the $15 that the mother requested because she did not have it. She stated that her daughter told her that she would have it in a few days because her boyfriend was going to commit a gun crime against a bookie on Long Island who owed him money. The mother stated that the weekend following the murder, her daughter gave her the $15. She stated that when she heard about the murder, she asked her daughter if the boyfriend was involved. Her daughter told her at that time that he was not. However, she stated that after meeting with the detectives, she had contacted her mother and told her the same thing that she told the detective. The mother testified that when her daughter told her about the incident, she did not mention the names of the defendant or the other man who was present.

Within days of the first meeting with the woman, the detectives had secured arrests on the defendant, the other man, and the boyfriend for murder, burglary, and robbery. The defendant who was functionally illiterate signed a statement, which detailed his involvement in the same light that the woman had reflected it. The statement was written by the detective and witnessed by him and another detective. The defendant later testified that he was not informed of his Miranda rights and that he had not dictated that statement. He stated that he had signed the paper after hours of interrogation, beatings, and threats. These claims presented issues of fact that were extensively litigated by both sides. Ultimately, the facts were resolved in favor of the police officers. The resulting statements was admitted at trial. The defendant was assigned a court appointed attorney to represent him. Two weeks after his arrest while he was incarcerated in the county jail, the defendant advised a Lieutenant at the Jail that he wanted to make a statement. He advised the Lieutenant that he had been at the murder location in the car outside the house, but that he had not gone inside. The defendant’s attorney made a motion to suppress the statement. The trial Judge denied the motion because it was made voluntarily and as a spontaneous utterance.

The defendant’s case was separated from the other defendants in the case in October, 1973. There was no identification evidence linking him to the crime. None of the other defendants testified at his trial. The entire case was established on the substance of out-of-court statements. Some of those statements, the most damning ones, were made by the woman. At the time of this trial, she had already committed suicide and was unable to testify. The others were the ones made to the detective and the one made to the Lieutenant. He was found guilty to each of the counts and sentenced to twenty years to life on the murder conviction alone. The other offenses received lesser time to run concurrently with the sentence for the murder.

Six months later, the cases against the remaining defendants: the other man and the boyfriend, were dismissed. The trial Judge in that case found that since the woman was dead, that it was impossible for the prosecution to establish a prima facie case. The case of the defendant went to appeal and the conviction was upheld.

The defendant’s gun crime attorney submitted a request to have the judgment set aside and a new trial ordered. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said he cited that the defendant’s statement in the jail to the Lieutenant was not made as a spontaneous utterance that could allow for an absence of the defendant’s attorney. Rather, he maintains that the mere fact that the defendant was incarcerated would have enabled the officer to wait until the attorney could be notified and present.

Additionally, he argues that admitting the hearsay testimony of the deceased woman did not qualify as a declaration against interest exception to the hearsay rule. The concept of a statement made as a declaration against interest is that most people do not make statements against their own interests. When a person does make a statement of that nature, it is believed that he must be responding to a truth-revealing compulsion as strong as if he was cross-examined as a witness.

In this case, the court decided that it was an error against law to allow the dead woman’s mother to testify to what her daughter had said to her since it was in no way a declaration against interest. Since, there was no acceptable exception to the hearsay rule she should not have been allowed to testify. The court also determined that the sentence should be reversed based on the fact that the woman had ulterior motives to make the statements. The spontaneity involved in the statement to the Lieutenant was considered admissible, but since the rest of the testimony was not, the case was overturned.

Stephen Bilkis & Associates with

In criminal trials, issues involving the admissibility of evidence often comes down to a fine matter of law. The authority of an officer to stop a vehicle or a person is restricted by articulable reasonable suspicion. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said that is a suspicion that can be put in to words that would lead a reasonable and prudent law enforcement officer given his training and experience, to believe that a crime is afoot. Case law has provided a further detail as far as the seizure or stop conducted by a police officer on a citizen. Whether the person is on foot or in a vehicle, if they flee upon sight of the readily obvious police officer, there is an immediate impression of a guilty mind. A guilty mind is also call mens rea. The evidence of flight when an officer attempts to initiate a traffic stop is also evidence of mens rea in a crime. This flight can become probable cause to make an arrest. Probable cause is that set of facts or circumstances that would lead a reasonable and prudent person given the same set of facts or circumstances to believe that a crime, is, has, or will be committed and that the person of interest, is involved in that crime.

However, if the court finds that the officer failed to show articulable reasonable suspicion, then the vehicle or person stop, is considered an illegal seizure. Any evidence of any crime that is discovered as a result of an illegal seizure is inadmissible in court based on the exclusionary rule. The evidence becomes fruit of the poisonous tree unless the police officers can demonstrate that the evidence would have inevitably been discovered anyway.

A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said that on September 16, 1975, at around one in the afternoon, an apartment building superintendent’s wife, noticed a man who was dressed in a white suit loitering around the back entrance to the building. She noticed that he glanced around in a furtive manner before entering the building located at 55 Lenox Road in Rockville Centre, Long Island. Around twenty minutes after she first noticed the man, she heard footsteps in an empty apartment above her own. She went upstairs to investigate and observed the man whom she had seen earlier, testing door knobs looking for unlocked apartments to enter. She went downstairs and notified her husband who went to the lobby and found the man just leaving the building. He noticed that the man had a large bunch of keys in his hand and he could hear more in his pocket.

He followed the prowler and came upon another apartment building superintendent walking down the street. They followed the man as he got into his car in the parking lot. The two men got in to a car belonging to the other superintendent and followed the suspect. They pulled up beside the suspect to get a better look at him. When they did, the other superintendent recognized the man as a prowler from his own building recently. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the two men wrote down a detailed description of the man and his license plate number. The superintendent called the police and gave them a description of the man.

While the officers were taking down the information from the superintendent, another officer located the suspect still in the area. He attempted to stop the suspect and the suspect took flight. He made several evasive maneuvers in his car, including putting the car in reverse to elude the police officers. He was arrested and his attorney filed a motion to suppress the evidence of the burglary tools that were located in the suspect’s car at the time of arrest.

The County trial court suppressed the evidence because they felt that the stop was an illegal seizure because the vehicle was stopped based on a description given to the police by a civilian witness. The case was appealed by the state and the appeals court upheld the verdict to suppress. A second appeal, determined that the trial court erred in suppressing the evidence. The state met its burden of proof that the subject was exhibiting behavior that a reasonable and prudent person would believe was indicative that a crime was afoot. This is evidenced by the fact that three different individuals observed the subjects behavior and interpreted it as indicative that a crime was afoot. The description of the suspect was provided in detail and the patrol officer attempted to stop the vehicle.

When the suspect observed the police officer’s emergency lights on the marked patrol car, he took flight. He was obviously attempting to elude the police when his vehicle maneuvers were so out of the ordinary as to include driving in reverse. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the final appeals court pointed out that prior case law upholds the fact that mens rea can be established at the time that the subject takes flight when he observes a police officer. In this case, the subject cannot deny that he took flight. He cannot deny that he could identify the marked patrol car with flashing lights and siren, as a police officer. His actions indicate mens rea.

Since the traffic stop of the subject was in fact, a legal seizure, the burglary tools that were ultimately recovered from the vehicle are also admissible. The appeals court found that the burglary tools were improperly suppressed by the County Court at the time of trial. Since the traffic stop was legal, the evidence is admissible. The defendant lost his motion to uphold the suppression of the evidence and a new trial that includes the evidence is ordered.

This case demonstrated how specific the law can be as it relates to the admissibility of evidence. The protection against illegal search and seizure as provided by the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution is taken very seriously. Under no circumstances can any evidence be used that is the product of an illegal search or seizure. The exclusionary rule ensures that all evidence that is the result of an illegal search or seizure is not admissible in court. However, in a situation like this one, where there was an abundance of probable cause to arrest the subject and conduct an administrative search of the vehicle that he was occupying; there is no doubt that the evidence should be admissible. It is not fruit of the poisonous tree.

In this case, the defendant might have had a minor argument for exclusion of the evidence if he had not attempted to elude the police officers. If that had occurred, then the officers would have only had the testimony of the superintendent. The judge has already ruled that the superintendent’s testimony was credible as to the suspicious nature of the suspect’s behavior. The superintendent knows more than anyone else what is suspicious in his building. The exclusionary rule is designed to protect the rights of all Americans in all areas. It just was not applicable in this situation. There are some exceptions to the exclusionary rule that can be of importance in criminal cases. Don’t trust your freedom and independence to the interpretation of others.

A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said that on June 9, 20009, police officers searched the apartment of a couple by virtue of a search warrant and seized drug paraphernalia, a .32 caliber hand gun, cocaine residue and the amount of $38,410.00.

The police arrested and charged the couple: the man was charged with criminal possession of a controlled substance in the seventh degree; while his wife was charged with felony possession of a weapon.

The woman entered a plea bargain. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said she agreed to plead guilty to the lesser crime of Disorderly Conduct instead of being tried and possibly being convicted of the charge of felony possession of a weapon.

The County of Nassau commenced an action to forfeit the sum of $38,410.00 which was seized from the couple. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the man now seeks to dismiss the forfeiture action on the ground that the case cannot be heard and tried without the presence of his wife who is a necessary party to the forfeiture case. The man and the woman filed a sworn affidavit claiming that the sum was their marital property and that it was the wife’s inheritance from her father’s estate.

The County of Nassau did not dispute that the woman had an interest in the money sought to be forfeited in the action but they dispute that she is a necessary party. They instead contend that she is a mere material witness to the proceedings who can testify as to the ownership of the funds.

The only question before the Court is whether or not the forfeiture case should be dismissed seeing that the wife has not been joined as a party to the case.

The Court held that a necessary party is one who might be inequitable affected by a judgment in the action. The reason why a necessary party must be compulsorily joined in an action is to protect their rights from being jeopardized if they have a material interest in the subject matter of the case.

The wife has a material interest in the money sought to be forfeited by the County. She claims that the money was her inheritance from her father’s estate and that it is a property of their marriage. It is clear that her material interest in the cash sought to be forfeited has been alleged. Her interest is that of owner or part-owner of the money sought to be forfeited.

A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the only question that must now be addressed is whether or not the failure of the County to join the wife as a necessary part is ground for dismissal of this action. The Court ruled that the case should not be dismissed.
The man contends that the case should be dismissed because the 120-day statute of limitation to commence an action against his wife has already expired. Thus, the wife can no longer be joined as a party because the action against her is time-barred.

The Court disagreed with the defendant. There is already an action that has been brought within the statute of limitations. The joining of the wife as a necessary party is not the commencement of a new action. She will only be brought under the jurisdiction of the court which has already taken cognizance of the case which is already being heard.

The Court then ruled that the wife may be joined as a defendant and if she so desires, she may assert the defense that the action against her is barred by the statute of limitations. This defense that the action against the wife is time-barred belongs properly to the wife and it cannot be asserted by the husband for and in her behalf.

The Court ordered the plaintiff County to serve the wife with supplemental summons and a copy of the complaint, a copy of this Order within twenty days. The wife is further given a period of 30 days from receipt of the summons and copies of the complaint and this Order to file her answer.

Have you been arrested for criminal possession of a weapon? Have any of your personal monies been seized as well? An experienced lawyer will tell you that you have the right to contest the seizure of monies seized in connection with the seizure of illegal weapons found in your possession. A skilled lawyer will also advice you that you must establish that the monies seized are not related to the illegal weapons seized. At Stephen Bilkis and Associates, their New York Gun Crime Attorneys are willing to advice, assist and defend you. Come and speak with any of the New York City Gun Crime attorneys at Stephen Bilkis and Associates. See them at any of their offices at Nassau County.

A fur store employee was present when the store was robbed by two-armed man. According to the employee’s statement, he and his employer were forced into the sales vault, handcuffed, and taped, and one of the gunmen hit him in the head with a gun. The employee was able to free himself and ran to the street, but the two robbers got away. Upon his return to the store, several police officers were on the scene. The man’s employer indicated that one of the robbers had left a gun on the bottom of the fur rack, and his employee saw it. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said that according to the employee’s statement, the police officer picked up the gun, put it on the desk, and the gun went off. The employee’s previous statement states that he did not see the gun being picked up and was only aware that it had been moved after he was shot. He turned to the location from where the bullet had traveled and saw the smoking gun on the desk, with the police officer holding it. The employee also claims that the police officer hit him and apologized.

The police officer testified that she had received firearms training as part of her police academy training and every year thereafter she received re-qualifying training. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said she testified as to past experiences handling guns at scenes of crimes and unloading her weapon. She was assigned to evidence collection on the day of the gun crime. At the scene, she was instructed to pick up the weapon to determine its type and she took a couple of photographs of the gun before she picked it up with her left hand on the barrel and her right hand on the butt. She could not tell if the slide had been pulled back and did not know if there was a safety. She held it with her finger, placed it evenly on the table and did not place it pointed in any particular position. When she placed it on the desk, the gun went off though she did not touch the trigger and did not know why the gun fired. The alleged gun crime victim was treated for tinnitus.

The employee filed a notice of claim upon the State alleging negligence and personal injuries. He alleged that he was carelessly and negligently shot by an unknown female police officer acting with the scope of her duties, and that the State and the City Police Department had negligently hired, trained, and supervised the officer, and should have known she was unfit to perform her duties. The employee commenced an action by filing summons and verified complaint.

A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said that according to the Police Department's supervisor in charge, the department records show a handgun was vouchered and categorized as investigatory. The gun was held for five months when it was delivered to the warehouse for disposal. The records show that the gun was destroyed three months after it was disposed.
The Police Department gunsmith who tested the gun testified the gun had already been tested in the ballistics lab and have been fired four times. It was found to be operable. He conducted various tests, including trying to reproduce the events that caused the gun to discharge. When he completed his assessment, the gun was returned to the unit handling the overall investigation. The gunsmith found that the gun had a light trigger pull off and it discharged inappropriately. When asked whether he could render an opinion to a reasonable degree of firearm certainty as to the cause of the discharge, he stated that the gun's sear was defective and did not sufficiently hold the hammer in position which would result in a discharge if there was impact to the weapon. He noted that the gun was likely dropped to the floor which may have caused the hammer and sear to shift and thus would not have required a lot of impact for it to go off. He could not determine whether the gun being dropped on the floor as distinguished to its being placed on the table was the proximate cause of its discharge. He said that placing the gun gently on the table would not cause it to discharge. He stated it was possible that an examination of the weapon might assist in determining what would be the proximate cause.

The employee moves to preclude the State and the City Police Department from presenting any evidence at trial regarding the testing or condition of the gun. The gun was destroyed more than two years after he filed his notice of claim and more than a year and a half after commencing his lawsuit. He argues that he is severely prejudiced because it was never made available for independent testing.

Given that the employee is severely hindered in prosecuting his claim because the gun which shot him is no longer in existence, although it was in the City's possession and destroyed more than a year and a half after the action was commenced, the employee's motion to preclude testimony and evidence concerning the condition of the gun is granted.

The employee seeks production of copies and transcripts of all tape recordings of interviews of all police and non-police witnesses related to the subject incident and a copy of the Final Report concerning the subject incident. He also seeks to produce authorization to obtain the police officer’s medical records for the date of the incident, and the training materials for handling of guns at crime scenes or for recovery of guns at crime scenes.

The State and the City Police are directed to produce tapes and transcripts only of eyewitnesses to the events. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said that the transcripts are to be stamped and shall be produced within 60 days of the date of entry of this decision and order. The branch of the employee's motion seeking to produce an unedited copy of the Final Report is denied.

The State and the City Police are to provide an authorization within 10 days of entry of the decision and order for the release of the police officer’s visit to the Hospital and to arrange for these records to be produced to the court for review to determine if they contain information as to statements recording what the police officer said as to the way the accident causing her injury occurred.

The State and the City Police counsel’s has agreed to direct a further search for police training materials. As noted, the employee seeks the training materials addressing the handling and recovery of guns at crime scenes. However, his attorney's reply affirmation asks not only for these materials but also a witness to be deposed on the limited issue of training provided to the Police Department Officers and members of the Crime Scene Recovery Unit. If no materials are found, then they must produce an individual with knowledge who undertook the search for the training materials. The employee request for a witness is denied as it was not part of the initial relief requested in his motion. The State and the City Police are directed to search diligently and produce any pertinent training materials within 45 days of the date of entry of the decision and order. If no materials are found, they shall produce an affidavit signed by the person or persons who undertook the search within the same 45-day period and shall detail the qualifications of any person who undertook the search, provide a detailed description of the reasonable efforts used to locate and produce the materials, including the date, time, and place of each search, and a meaningful explanation as to why such materials are not available or do not exist.

Negligence of one person can cause serious harm to others. The Nassau County Criminal Lawyer can work to make sure that whoever mishandled the weapon that caused you hurt would be dealt with properly.

On the night of April 26, 1974, two Nassau County police officers were working undercover in plainclothes on a burglary sting in a well-lit shopping and entertainment area in Wantach, Long Island. There had been several burglaries in the area and they were attempting to apprehend the suspects. While they were watching, they observed a Buick driving slowly down the street. The vehicle slowed down perceptibly in front of a bar and all three of the occupants turned to look at the windows of the establishment. The vehicle proceeded farther down the street to a stop sign. The vehicle stopped at the sign and again, all of the occupants turned to examine the windows of another bar on the side of the road. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the officers considered this behavior to be consistent with the behavior of a person “casing” a building before attempting to burglarize it. They initiated a traffic stop of the vehicle.

Upon stopping the vehicle, the officers requested that the driver provide his driver’s license. He advised that he did not have a driver’s license. The officers requested the registration on the vehicle and the subjects stated that they did not have it. The vehicle was owned by the mother of one of the passengers. The men were later discovered to have her permission to drive the car. The occupants of the car were asked to exit the vehicle. When they were outside of the vehicle, the officers executed a terry stop and frisk of them. One of the officers felt a suspicious bulge in the pocket of one of the passengers. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said when he retrieved the items, they proved to be bullets. A subsequent search of the area within the subjects immediate control, led the officers to find a gun concealed under the front seat of the car.

The question of law in this case is whether the stop of the car was justified or was it an illegal seizure. The rules of law that dictate when an officer can stop a car are clearly documented in statutory law. It states that an officer may stop a vehicle that he observes committing a crime. In absence of an immediate crime, if the officer has articulable reasonable suspicion to believe that a crime is afoot, he may stop the vehicle to investigate. In this case, the officers stated that they had merely seen the occupants glance at two bars as they drove down the street. The fact that they stopped twice is not relevant since one of those stops was at a stop sign.

The officer who executed the stop testified, that he just knew that a crime was about to happen. The justices note that the officer’s instincts were probably correct, but that the officers responded too quickly. They state that the officers would have done better to observe the car for a longer amount of time to determine what the occupants were up to. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said that under the circumstances, to claim that driving down the road and glancing at bars would be enough to satisfy the requirement for articulable reasonable suspicion would be a reach. The justices overturned the verdict based on the fact that the stop of the vehicle constituted an illegal seizure on the part of the officers involved.

The defendant was released based on the overturned verdict as far as the gun crime was concerned. However, he was on probation at the time of the traffic stop. His proximity to the gun and the circumstances involved in the traffic stop were enough to place him in violation of his probation. His case was remanded back to the courts for a trial of fact as it relates to his violation of probation.

A Stephen Bilkis & Associates with Nassau County Criminal Lawyer can help you if you are arrested. They have convenient offices throughout New York and Metropolitan area. A Nassau County Arrest Lawyer can provide you with advice and protect your rights. Without a Nassau County Possession of a Weapon Lawyer, you could lose your freedom

Parole Officer One has been employed by the New York State Division of Parole since August 1993. She was assigned to supervise the parole of the defendant in July 2006. The defendant had been paroled on a burglary conviction. Upon his release, he had signed the conditions of parole which included his consent to a search of his residence, person and property and required him to fully and truthfully answer any inquiry by his parole officer or other representative of the Division of Parole. When Officer One first met with the defendant, the consent to search provision was reiterated to him and he reaffirmed his consent. A private individual gave his residence as 87 East 31st Street in Kings County. No previous searches had been conducted by Officer One at the defendant's residence.

A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the defendant, as a condition of his parole, was referred to a drug program in November 2006. In December 2006, and January and February 2007, the defendant tested “positive” for cocaine. On 15 March 2007, Officer One, in consultation with parole supervisors and Parole Officer Two, decided to do a home visit with the intention of doing a search. At that time, Officer Three was assigned to the "Targeted Offender Program" which was then doing visits in cases where the parolees, as the defendant, had been convicted of burglary.
On 16 March 2007, prior to conducting any home visits, Parole Officer Two met with other officers of the 67th Precinct Anti-Crime Unit who had been assigned to assist him in the execution of the home visits. Parole Officer Two had selected the parolees' homes which would be visited and identified them to the police officers. He also told the police officers the number of people to expect at each home and the crime for which the parolee was on parole. Parole Officer One did not participate in the visit or search.

Parole Officer Two chose to visit the defendant's residence at 87 East 31st Street first because it was geographically the closest address to the precinct house. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said Parole Officer Two, in the company of the police officers, knocked on the door of the defendant's second floor apartment. When the defendant opened the door, Parole Officer Two explained to the defendant that he wanted to conduct a parole search of his apartment. After the defendant orally consented to the search, Parole Officer Two and the police officers entered the premises. The defendant was directed to sit on a couch which was in the middle of the living room. The defendant was not handcuffed during the search. The defendant's teenage daughter, who was still in her pajamas, was told to get dressed and to take a seat on the couch.

Parole Officer Two then walked into a bedroom to the left of the living room and asked the defendant if it was his room. The defendant replied that it was his room.

The Police Officer who was standing directly in front of and to the right of the defendant had a direct view of Parole Officer Two inside the bedroom. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the defendant also had a direct view of the Parole Officer. Parole Officer Two walked over to an armoire and asked the defendant if it was his. The defendant replied that the armoire was his. Parole Officer Two then opened the door to the armoire and asked the defendant if the clothing inside was his. The defendant stated that the clothes were his. Parole Officer Two continued his search of the armoire and subsequently removed two large blocks of a white, powdery substance that were vacuum sealed. These blocks were approximately, one to one and a half (1½) inches thick and probably about the size of an eight by ten. Parole Officer Two asked the defendant what they were. The defendant replied: "You know what that is, it appears to be cocaine" and thereafter acknowledged that they were his. Parole Officer Two then collected a large amount of money from various locations in the bedroom.

Officer Two continued his search in the living room. At the entertainment center, Parole Officer Two opened two doors underneath the television set and pulled out a duffel bag. Inside the duffel bag, he discovered a shoe box that contained a firearm. Parole Officer Two gave the firearm to one of the Police Officers who put it in his waistband for safekeeping; he was also given the two large blocks of white powder which he put inside the shoe box along with the bullets from the firearm. The defendant was handcuffed and placed under arrest. During the search, the defendant had not been threatened or promised anything to elicit any admissions or statements. There was no evidence of any coercion. In response to pedigree questioning, the defendant admitted that he lived at this address.

From the time the defendant was placed under arrest to the time he was taken to the precinct approximately 10 to 30 minutes passed. During this time, the defendant's daughter's aunt, had arrived in response to a phone call to pick up the defendant's daughter. The aunt stood in the living room. The defendant was sitting with his daughter on the couch having a conversation. The defendant was overheard encouraging his daughter to take her school bag, which was in the living room, when she left with her aunt. One of the police officers described the bag as a backpack which a child or teenager would normally carry. When the defendant's daughter picked up the bag and started to leave with it, the police searched the bag. A large amount of money and a couple of sets of car keys were recovered from the bag. The defendant's daughter had neither a driver's license nor a car. The defendant's daughter was about 15 to 16 years old. The defendant's daughter was placed under arrest. The police officer explained that the defendant's daughter was arrested because it appeared that she knew of the situation in the apartment, i.e., the narcotics and firearm and may have played a role in what was going on in the apartment and that she was trying to leave with money and car keys.

After the defendant's daughter was arrested, the defendant and his daughter were in the same room. No one said anything to the defendant at that time about his daughter's arrest. A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the defendant and his daughter were subsequently transported to the 67th Precinct.

Later that day, the two Parole Officers were present with the defendant for approximately 1½ to two hours at the District Attorney's Office. The defendant's daughter was also present. Miranda warnings were never administered to the defendant in Parole Officer One’s presence. The defendant was told that his daughter could also be charged. Thereafter, the defendant said that: "It's all mine." The People conceded that this admission could not be used as evidence-in-chief but sought to use it as impeachment material if the defendant testified at his trial.
A Huntley hearing was conducted.

At a hearing to suppress a statement made to law enforcement officials, the People have the burden of demonstrating, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the defendant's statement was voluntary in the traditional sense and, if applicable, that the defendant had knowingly, intelligently and voluntarily waived his or her Miranda rights prior to making the statement.
Miranda warnings are only required when a defendant is subjected to custodial interrogation by law enforcement officials. The test for determining whether a defendant was in custody at the time of his statement is whether a reasonable person, in the defendant's position, innocent of any crime, would have believed that he or she was under arrest.

Here, the defendant was not in custody at the time he was asked about the bedroom, the armoire, the clothing and the two large vacuum sealed blocks found inside the armoire. At the time of this questioning, the defendant was sitting on a couch in his living room while Parole Officer Two was posing questions from inside the bedroom. The police officers present were merely standing in the living room. They did not have their guns drawn. Moreover, the defendant had not been handcuffed and had not been placed under arrest. Thus, there was nothing in this environment or the questioning of the defendant which would have caused a reasonable person, innocent of a crime, to have believed that he was in custody.

Ordinarily, in a noncustodial setting, law enforcement questioning would not need to be preceded by Miranda warnings to render any responses admissible. However, since this case involves questioning by a parole officer, this finding may not be determinative.

It must be noted that in the case of People v Parker and subsequent cases, the Appellate Division, Second Department, in a landmark case did not create a per se rule that any questioning of a parolee by a parole officer concerning criminal activity must be preceded by Miranda warnings to render any statement admissible at a criminal trial. If the affirmance by the Court of Appeals had endorsed such a per se rule, the Court would not have had to caution that its ruling in another case, People v English, was limited and that the Court had not decided the issue in cases of noncustodial questioning. The Parker holding had two elements, i.e., noncustodial questioning by a parole officer regarding suspected criminal activity, and, second, charges of criminal activity against the defendant and/or his or her representation by counsel. Thus, while binding in its limited factual context, it is distinguishable from this case and thus does not control the result.

The court must next decide what ruling to follow. As is obvious, the court finds the ruling in the other case overly expansive and contrary to the narrow holding in Parker. Clearly, the reasoning enunciated in another case rejecting a per se rule is more compelling as the Appellate Division properly distinguished Parker and its ruling is in conformity with federal constitutional law which permits the noncustodial interrogation of a parolee by his parole officer without Miranda warnings.

Defendant's statements to Parole Officer Two are admissible. While the parole officer suspected that the defendant may have been involved in criminal activity based on his positive drug tests, no charges were pending, no felony complaint had been filed and the defendant's right to counsel had not attached. The questions asked of the defendant were reasonably related to the officer's role in effecting an authorized search of the defendant's apartment and limiting the scope of that search. The defendant was not in custody when Parole Officer Two made his inquiries. Therefore, based on the conclusion that People v Parker, is factually distinguishable and relying on People v Edwards, the court finds that the parole officer was not required to give Miranda warnings prior to asking his questions.

The court also finds that the defendant's response to the parole officer's questions were voluntary in the traditional sense. The defendant's answers were not the product of any coercion, threats, promises or deprivation. The defendant was not handcuffed at the time.
Accordingly, defendant's motion to suppress his alleged statements in his apartment is denied.
If you find yourself in a situation related to or similar with the above, get legal representation immediately. Rights are crucial in the inquiry stage prior to arrests. Rights could be waived without your knowledge. To know more, get in touch with Stephen Bilkis & Associates. Have a free consultation with a New York DWI Lawyer or a New York Criminal Lawyer from our firm.

A New York Criminal Lawyer said sometime in 1980, two police officers were sitting in an unmarked police car conducting surveillance of a street corner where there had been reports of crack possession and sale.

The police officers observed a man sell a tinfoil packet to another man. The police officers exited their vehicle and approached the two men. They tried to run but the officers apprehended them. When they were frisked, the officers found 23 other tinfoil packets thought to be crack in the man’s possession. The packets contained the controlled substances of phenycyclidine and methaqualone pills.

A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the man was arrested and charged for criminal possession of ecstacy, a controlled substance in the fifth and seventh degrees. The man pleaded not guilty to the charge and took the witness stand as a witness in his own behalf. He interposed the defense of mistaken identity and that of frame-up.

During the trial, the arresting officer was presented. He not only testified as to the events he observed during the surveillance he conducted, the ecstacy sale he witnessed, and the events leading to the apprehension and arrest of the man. The District Attorney also asked him questions relating to his experience as a police officer.

Over the man’s objection, the police officer testified that he had participated in over 35 ecstacy and crack possession arrests in the same area where the man was arrested for drug trafficking. He testified as to the pattern of a typical drug sale.

The man objected to this part of the officer’s testimony on the ground that the police officer was already testifying not as to specific facts in his personal knowledge but he was testifying as to his opinion on what a typical drug sale looks like. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said in other words, he was testifying as an expert. He also objected to this part of the officer’s testimony on the ground that it prejudiced the jury against him.

The trial court judge ruled that the testimony was admissible but only to demonstrate the arresting officer’s background and experience as a police officer. When he instructed the jury, he stressed to them that the testimony is only to be considered to prove the arresting officer’s ability to observe and perceive.

The man appealed not only his jury conviction but he also assailed the admission of the testimony of the police officer regarding the 35 other crack possession and ecstacy possession arrests in that same corner as an error on the part of the trial court judge. The only question before the Supreme Court is whether or not trial court judge committed an error.
The Supreme Court ruled that the arresting officer’s testimony regarding the 35 other drug crime arrests in the same area is irrelevant. The arresting officer’s testimony as to the standard surveillance procedure is also irrelevant.

A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the Court held that the testimony is antecedent and independent of a crime. It may be admitted only when there is an ambiguity in any material fact of the case. The testimony constitutes background evidence which cannot be admitted if the events and elements constituting the crime are not ambiguous.

Also the Court held that admitting that part of the officer’s testimony tended to prejudice the jury against the defendant making him appear guilty by mere association. It was damaging to the defendant who is presumed innocent until proven guilty. The police officer’s testimony regarding the 35 previous drug crime arrests in the same street corner as well as his testimony interpreting the defendant’s behavior as typical of drug traffickers smacks of opinion testimony. In effect, the police officer was no longer testifying as to what he had seen and heard of his own personal knowledge, but he gave an opinion that the defendant was guilty.

According to the Court, only the jury can determine whether the defendant is guilty or not. The jury must make this determination only on evidence that tends to prove the crime charged and they must not be influenced by irrelevant and prejudicial facts and circumstances. The judgment of conviction was reversed and a new trial was ordered.

A New York Drug Crime Attorney from Stephen Bilkis and Associates will advice you that if you are charged with possession of drugs or sale of drugs, the arresting officer can only testify as to facts he himself personally observed. A New York City Drug Crime Attorney will advise you to object to the admission of testimony that gives an opinion of your guilt. Call Stephen Bilkis and Associates today. See any of their NYC Drug Crime lawyers at any of their offices conveniently located around the New York area. The NY Drug Crime lawyers as Stephen Bilkis and Associates are ready and willing to assist you.

Whenever evidence of a crime is discovered by police during an inventory search of a person’s vehicle, it is subject to scrutiny. Inventory searches are administrative searches. That means that the police department or agency maintains documents in their standard operating procedures manual that indicates that an inventory of an arrested person’s vehicle will be performed incident to that arrest. A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said the reason for inventory searches is that people often make allegations that items are missing from their vehicles. The inventory of the person’s vehicle incident to their arrest is to determine what exactly is in the vehicle. Anything that appears to be valuable needs to be removed and placed into evidence or property so that the person can re-claim their valuables upon getting out of jail. The police department is protected from allegations of theft, and all valuables are protected for the individual.

However, in many cases, illegal items, narcotics, open alcoholic beverage container, stolen credit cards, and other items are located during the inventory of a vehicle. It is at that point that the officer must be able to prove that the search was an administrative search and not a search for contraband. That is why it is important for police officers to have their procedures documented.

In a case that was decided before the Supreme Court of New York County on November 18, 2009, a defendant who was charged with one count of Criminal Possession of a Weapon in the second degree and with driving under the influence of alcohol. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said he man was arrested following a traffic stop. The officer stated that he observed a Lexus pulled up to a fire hydrant. There was a white male behind the wheel of the car. When the officer pulled up, the man got out of the car and approached the officer. The officer stated that the man’s eyes were glassy and bloodshot, he exuded a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage from about his person, and he was unsteady on his feet.

He was asked to take field sobriety tests and he refused. He was arrested for DUI. He also refused the breathalyzer test at the precinct where his car was inventoried. During the course of conducting the inventory search of the car, the defendant’s sister arrived at the precinct. She introduced herself to the officers. She identified herself as a Metropolitan Transit Police Officer and noticed that she had graduated from the police academy with the arresting officer in the case.

She accompanied him out to the car and he released many of the defendant’s personal items into her custody. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said while conducting the inventory, he moved to inventory the trunk. When he opened the trunk, he observed a closed bag. When he looked inside the bag, he located a firearm. The defendant was notified of the additional charge.

In court, the defendant maintained that the gun was the fruit of the poisonous tree under the Exclusionary Rule. The Exclusionary Rule states that any evidence of any crime that is obtained pursuant to an illegal search is inadmissible in court as evidence unless the police can show that they would have inevitably discovered the evidence anyway.

In this situation, a Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the defendant claimed that he was not driving the car. He stated that he was already outside the car when the officer arrived. This would have made an impound of the vehicle pursuant to an arrest invalid and any proceeds from that search would have been illegal.

The court found that the search was within the guidelines set forth in the procedure manual and thus the search was upheld and the gun was ruled as valid evidence. Stephen Bilkis & Associates have Criminal Lawyers who can fight for you. Their New York DUI Lawyers are familiar with handling cases in criminal courts where the Exclusionary Rule is an issue. Many items can fall into the category of illegal searches when the case is DWI. At Stephen Bilkis & Associates, we have offices throughout New York and the Metropolitan area. Being able to defend the client’s interest is of the utmost importance to us.

These are two separate cases which were decided by the Supreme Court jointly as the issues are similar.

A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said that in the first case, a male employee of a manufacturing corporation stopped by a summer picnic on June 12, 1980 at Powder Mill Park in Rochester, New York. The summer picnic was organized by an employees’ social and athletic association whose members were all employees of the manufacturing corporation. The association had two annual social functions: the Christmas party and the summer picnic. The association collects $1 in monthly dues from its members and charges $5 for a ticket to the party. Food was freely available as was beer.

The male employee drank 6 or 8 cans of beer from the open bar. He left at around 10:30 p.m. and drove to a tavern and met up with friends. He continued drinking there until 2:00 a.m. At or around 2:30 a.m. he was driving home on the interstate 490 and when he got on the exit ramp, he figured in a head-on collision with a car driven by another. The male employee pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor charge of driving while intoxicated.

According to a New York Drug Possession Lawyer the injured driver whose car was hit head-on by the car driven by the drunk male employee filed a civil suit in damages against the male employee, the tavern, the president of the employees’ association and the manufacturing corporation that employed the drunk male employee. He sued them all under New York’s Dram Shop Act because they sold and served alcohol that caused the male employees intoxication.

After trial, the trial court dismissed the complaint against the manufacturing corporation that employed the drunk driver ad also against the employees’ association. But it held the drunk male employee liable in negligence and the tavern for violation of the Dram Shop Act.
The injured driver appealed this decision of the trial court.

A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said that in the second case, a male employee worked as a machine operator at a tube company. He was working the second shift which started at 2:30 p.m. He took a break at 6:30 p.m. When he came back two hours later, the foreman at the tube company smelled alcohol on the breath of the machine operator and noticed that his eyes did not look right. The foreman then informed the machine operator that he was too drunk to perform his duties safely and fired him. He told him to leave the work premises.

The foreman saw the drunk machine operator leave the work premises. What he did not know was that the machine operator got into his car and drove home. About a mile away, the machine operator who was driving under the influence of alcohol swerved from his lane and drove his car onto the opposite lane. His car collided head-on with another car. The couple who were in that car both died.

A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer stated that the heirs of the couple who died as a result of being hit by the drunk machine operator’s car sued the machine operator, as well as the foreman and the owner of the tube company. The heir alleged that the foreman and the owner of the tube company were negligent in allowing the obviously drunk machine operator to drive while intoxicated.
The trial court denied the motion for summary judgment filed by the tube company owner. This order was appealed and on appeal, the appellate division reversed the trial court.
In these two cases, the common issue is whether or not the employers are liable for the accidents caused by their employees who left the workplace drunk and drove their cars while under the influence of alcohol and caused injury to others.

The Supreme Court stated that the law considered the act of drinking alcohol as the immediate cause of the injury but not the furnishing of the alcohol with which the drunk driver got drunk on. The Court differentiated the liability of landowners who have a duty to prevent harm to those who happen upon their property. Here the injuries resulted to the victims when they were already outside of the employer’s premises (the machine operator was fired while the other male employee had already gone home for the day)
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The Court opined that while it is morally desirable to control and to supervise drinking so that those who drink cannot and will not cause injury to another, the courts cannot create a new legal duty where the law imposed none. There is a legal duty for employers to keep inebriated employees from driving or operating machinery while intoxicated while those employees are still at work and within the work premises; or, even when the intoxicated employees are out of the premises as long as they were still performing their duties. These two drunken employees were no longer at work; they were not longer discharging their functions as employees; and they were no longer within the work premises. They cannot be made liable for the injuries caused by them to third persons.

If you think that a criminal indictment for driving while intoxicated is the only thing you have to worry about, you probably did not know that those victims of injury caused by a drunk driver have a right to bring a suit in damages in civil courts. You need lawyer to help you present evidence and argue your case in civil courts as well. At Stephen Bilkis and Associates, attorneys are ready to assist and to defend you both in the criminal as well as the civil case arising from a driving while intoxicated charge. Call Stephen Bilkis and Associates and ask to meet with a New York DWI lawyer to can help you.

A New York Drug Crime Lawyer said that a police officer from New York City was almost struck by a truck while he was inside his vehicle patrolling the streets just before midnight. The officer testified that the truck went backward into the junction from on-street parking space without its rear lights illuminated. He also simultaneously sounded his horn and put his vehicle in reverse to avoid a collision. The truck then pulled forward, returning to its parking space. When the officer parked his vehicle and approached the truck, he saw that the man was seated in the driver's seat with the engine running. The officer asked the man where he was going and responded that he was heading home. After the officer obtained his license and registration information, the man turned off the engine and went out of the truck. Noticing a strong odor of alcohol, the officer asked whether the man had been drinking. The man acknowledged that he had consumed few beers at a bar on the adjacent corner.

Subsequently, the man's father came out from the bar and began yelling at the officer. The man handed his father set of keys and the father returned to the bar after being directed by the officer to stand back from the area. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said field sobriety tests were administered in which the man failed, and was placed under arrest. Based on the record, field sobriety tests are evaluations done by law enforcement officers in making roadside assessment as to whether a motorist is under the influence of alcohol or drugs. At the trial, the man stipulated to the propriety, reliability and admissibility of the succeeding breathalyzer test which revealed that his blood alcohol content was 0.15%.

In contrast to the officer's version of the events, the man claimed that he left the bar to lock the truck and did not operate the vehicle at that time. He also offered the testimony of family members and friends and asserted that they were drinking with him in the bar when he announced that he was going outside to lock his truck. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said they claimed that the man intended to return to the bar and was planning to spend the night at a friend's house which was within walking distance. The witnesses acknowledged that they didn’t see what happened outside after he departed from the bar. Hence, the bottom of the defense was that since the man left his keys on the bar, he was unable to operate his truck. Only one witness, his brother-in-law, was able to identify the keys as those to the ignition of the truck.

Even though the man acknowledged that he was intoxicated at the time in question, he still contends on the appeal that the verdict convicting him of two counts of DWI (driving while intoxicated) was unsupported by adequate proof and against the weight of the evidence due to the court’s failure to demonstrate that he operated the motor vehicle. However, a Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said that in the police officer's statement that he saw the truck move back and forth into the parking space with the man sitting on the driver's seat with the engine running as he approached the vehicle was sufficient enough to establish operation of the vehicle. The verdict against the weight of the evidence as the officer's account was not directly disproven by any of the defense witnesses, none of whom were outside the bar at the relevant time. The statement to the effect that the man could not have been operating the truck because his keys remained in the bar presented credibility questions which the jury, reasonably resolved in the court's favor. Accordingly, the decision is affirmed.
There are instances in our lives when we are incapable of defending ourselves and nobody is willing to testify to tell the truth. NY DWI Lawyers at Stephen Bilkis & Associates are capable of protecting you against these events. You may visit our offices which are located all throughout the New York Metropolitan area.

Several police officers were charged with various crimes arising out of their conduct in connection with their search for a lost police radio. According to a New York Drug Crime Lawyer, the records of the case, the police officers went to two apartments to pursue a lead regarding the radio. The radio had been lost during an arrest related to a drug crime in the area several days earlier. The records said the police officers pushed their way into two apartments, ransacking both, and unlawfully detained the individuals encountered within the apartments. In searching the second apartment, the police officers discovered vials of crack coccaine and threatened the occupants therein that they would be charged with coccaine possession if the radio were not promptly returned. The police officers allegedly told the apartment occupants that they would "forget" about the drugs if the radio was returned. Administrative proceedings were then commenced against the police officers by conducting hearings.

Following a jury trial, each police officer was found guilty of unlawful imprisonment, coercion, criminal trespass, and official misconduct. Two of the officers were also convicted of falsifying business records. Prior to sentencing, the police officers moved to set aside the verdict alleging improper use of their statements in connection with the indictment and trial.

A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said that among the numerous issues raised on appeal, the police officers challenged the sufficiency of the trial evidence, the cour'ts charge on unlayful imprisonment, alleged inconsistencies in jury verdict and the court's restriction on cross-examination of certain witnesses. Each of the police officers gave similar statements essentially denying any wrongdoing. The policemen testified in court that they saw one of the occupants of the apartment in the alley and he dropped the cocaine when he saw the police officers. One of the policemen said he has arrested the same person for marijuana possession prior to the incident.

The court found that the evidence was more than sufficient to sustain the jury's verdict of guilt, that all the elements of the crimes charged were established and that the guilty verdicts as to certain counts and not guilty verdicts as to others are not inconsistent with one another. While the police officers continue to claim that, at worst, their conduct constituted no more than an impermissible search for which there is no criminal liability, and that to uphold the guilty verdicts would be to seriously "chill the ability and good faith efforts of law enforcement to protect the public, the evidence before the jury amply demonstrated that defendants far exceeded the bounds of permissible police conduct and that they committed the crimes of which they were found guilty.

A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said that the court noted that an indictment is not fatlly tainted merely because someone involved in the criminal prosecution may have been exposed to a portion or all of the police officers' immunized statement, although clearly precautions should be taken -- and stringently observed -- to prevent such occurrence.

Drug addiction is a rampant problem in society and affects everyone. Being involved in a lawsuit arising from this crime is difficult. There are attorneys will stand by you and help see you through your case. These attorneys can argue your side and make sure that you and your loved ones are compensated.

Stephen Bilkis & Associates with its Queens Drug Possession Lawyers, has offices throughout the New York Metropolitan area. Our attorneys can provide you with advice to guide you through your difficult situations. Without our attorneys, you may lose your rights which may cost you a significant amount of money.

Two couples went out on a group dinner date on February 2, 1960. According to a New York Drug Crime Lawyer, after dinner, they drove to a restaurant on Staten Island at around 9:00 p.m. In between the dance numbers, the two couples drank. One lady passed out from having taken too much alcohol. Her date steadily drank double bourbons straight. Her date became drunk and noisy. He fell to the floor and some bystanders told the bartender not to give the obviously drunk man anymore to drink.

The bartender kept giving the man more double bourbons reasoning that the man was just enjoying himself. Later, at 1:00 p.m., the two couples left the restaurant. The lady who passed out was asleep in the passenger seat in front. Her date, the man who passed out after imbibing several double bourbons insisted on driving.

When the car had travelled about nine miles from the restaurant, the lady’s date who was driving while intoxicated lost control of the car which veered off the road and crashed into a building. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said the driver was killed and his date who was sleeping in the front seat was seriously injured.

She sued the restaurant and the bartender under the Dram Shop Act. The jury found for the lady and on appeal by the bartender and the restaurant, the appellate division affirmed the jury verdict.

A Nassau Count Drug Possession Lawyer said that the Supreme Court is asked to decide if the jury verdict finding the restaurant and the bartender liable for damages for the injuries sustained by the sleeping lady is proper under the statutes.

The Supreme Court first stated that the Alcoholic Beverage Control Law defines it as a crime for any person to sell any alcoholic beverage to a person who is already intoxicated or already under the influence of liquor. This law also recognizes that any person who is injured by the intoxicated person has a right of action against the person who caused or contributed to the intoxication. The injured person is entitled to actual and exemplary damages from the person who caused the intoxication.

A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said the Court traced the history of this law, stating that in 1873, the law prohibited the injured person from recovering damages from the person who sold alcohol to an intoxicated person who caused the injury if the injured person was also intoxicated.
This is what the restaurant and the bartender contended: they assert that they cannot be found liable for the injury to the lady because the lady herself was drunk at that time. They claim that the lady’s drinking caused or contributed to her date’s intoxication.

The Supreme Court rejected their argument. Just because the lady was also intoxicated did not mean that she caused the intoxication of her date. She cannot be deprived of the right to recover actual and exemplary damages. The Court reasoned that the lady got drunk while drinking with Taylor but she did nothing to encourage him to drink more. She passed out before he got really drunk and fell on the floor. She was asleep, passed out from having drunk too much, at the time that her date kept drinking more and more of the alcohol sold to him by the bartender. Simply drinking with her date who later became intoxicated cannot be viewed as causing the intoxication or contributing to the intoxication of her date. Her own drinking cannot be viewed as a contributory factor to the intoxication of her date. For these reasons, the court upheld and affirmed the jury verdict in favor of the lady.

When facing a civil suit in damages for causing injury to another while driving under the influence of alcohol, can you raise the defense that the bartender who kept selling you alcohol even when you were so obviously intoxicated should also be held jointly liable? Call Stephen Bilkis and Associates and talk to any of their attorneys. They can help explore the possibility of mitigating your liability for damages by giving you a possible defense: you and the person who got injured by you can also run against the bartender who kept selling you drinks.

According to a New York Drug Crime Lawyer, a 59-year old man is currently serving an aggregate prison term of 21-1/2 years to life arising out of his 1982 convictions for various drug crimes, including marijuana possession, and attempted escape from prison. The prisoner challenged the denial of his application for parole before the Board of Parole. .

The court held that record demonstrates that the Board appropriately considered the statutory factors, including the seriousness of the prisoner's crimes, his prior criminal history, positive program achievements while incarcerated and post-release plans.

While the dissent minimized the seriousness of the prisoner's offenses, describing them as neither violent nor accompanied by a history of violent crimes, the record before the Board showed that the prisoner petitioner had been a drug dealer for 10 years and that his activities escalated to high-level cocaine trafficking that did, in fact, directly lead to the violent death of one police officer and the grievous wounding of another at the hands of his co-defendant brother. The court said that, contrary to the dissent's view, the Board could reach its conclusion after weighing the prisoner's accomplishments in prison against the level of violence associated with the drug trafficking and the drug crimes of which he was convicted without improperly considering matters outside the record

A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said that the court also said that it is not its role to assess whether the Board gave the proper weight to the relevant factors, nor articulate each factor in its decision, and it is permissible for the Board to emphasixe the seriousness of a petitioner's offense. It is only important to determine whether the Board followed the statutory guidelines and rendered a determination that is supported, and not contradicted, by the facts in the record. The court further said that it could not effectively review the Board's weighing process, given that it is not required to state each factor that it considers, weigh each factor equally or grant parole as a reward for exemplary institutional behavior.

The dissent noted that the 1980 drug crime committed by the prison involved a large amount of cocaine, but, unlike many other cases in which the Board has relied primarily on the seriousness of an offender's crimes in denying parole, the prisoner's crimes were neither violent nor accompanied by a history of other serious or violent crimes. The dissent further noted that the prisoner had a perfect disciplinary record for at least 15 years, completed all of the recommended programs, overcome drug and alcohol addictions, and participated in various vocational and educational programs. A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer said the prisoner's post-release plan include participation in a veterans' transitional employment program and volunteering in programs for substance abusers.

Accordingly, a Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said that the court concluded that as the Board's determination in this case is supported by the record and does not display irrationality bordering on impropriety. The court declined to disturb the denial of the application for parole.

Drug addiction is a rampant problem in society and affects everyone. Being involved in a lawsuit arising from this crime is difficult. There attorneys will stand by you and help see you through your case. These attorneys can argue your side and make sure that you and your loved ones are compensated.

Stephen Bilkis & Associates has offices throughout the New York Metropolitan area. Our attorneys can provide you with advice to guide you through your difficult situations. Without our attorneys, you may lose your rights which may cost you a significant amount of money.

Two adult men appealed from judgments of a state court convicting them after a joint trial of the drug crimes of sale of a dangerous drug and marijuana possession and sentencing each of them to seven years imprisonment.

According to a New York Drug Crime Lawyer, one of the accused argued on appeal that the court had previously accepted a plea of guilty to the lesser crime of attempted criminal possession of a dangerous drug, a Class E felony, to cover the entire indictment; that thereafter, the court unilaterally set aside that plea and directed a trial upon which the defendants were convicted of the Class C felony for which they were indicted and for which they have now been sentenced. In essence, they assert a claim of double jeopardy.

Sources, however, showed that during the joint trial the accused applied to withdraw his plea of guilty and the court granted that application, and this was the understanding of all at the time. A New York Drug Possession Lawyer said it is apparent that the court thought that the defendant was moving to withdraw his plea and not that the court was acting unilaterally.

The court explained that a major purpose of requiring a party to make known his objection to an action by the court is so that the court shall have an opportunity of effectively changing the same. The court pointed out that if the defendant's attorney at that point in the joint trial had thought and said that he had not made an application to withdraw the plea of guilty, there can be no doubt that the court would have required him to say whether he was or was not moving to withdraw the plea. The court noted that the defendant's attorney did not suggest in any way to the court that the court's interpretation was incorrect. But now appellate counsel reading the cold record urges the court to interpret what took place in a way different from what the parties understood at the time.

A Nassau Count Drug Possession Lawyer commented that if the court had unilaterally and improperly purported to set aside a plea of guilty, the defendant would have had an a defense of previous prosecution to any further proceedings, which would be the subject matter of a motion in the trial court to dismiss the indictment. However, the defendant never raised that argument. Plainly, rather than be sentenced to something more than one year imprisonment, defendant chose to gamble on a trial.

The court thinks there was abuse of discretion and that a reversal of the indictment is not warranted. The court noted that the defendant had what the court at sentence called 'an extensive criminal background.' A Queens Drug Possession Lawyer said that these crimes, as brought out in connection with the motion, included assault and robbery, a grand larceny automobile arrest which had apparently resulted in a felony conviction for which he served time in state prison, possession of drugs, resisting arrest, and criminal sale of dangerous drugs.

Drug addiction is a rampant problem in society and affects everyone. Being involved in a lawsuit arising from this crime is difficult. There are New York Drug Crime Attorneys will stand by you and help see you through your case. These Attorneys can argue your side and make sure that you and your loved ones are compensated.

Stephen Bilkis & Associates with its NY Criminal Law Lawyers, has offices throughout the New York Metropolitan area including Corona, NY. Our Attorneys can provide you with advice to guide you through your difficult situations. Without our Attorneys, you may lose your rights which may cost you a significant amount of money.

Stephen Bilkis and Associates will also recommend Substance Abuse Lawyers who will help you.

On April 20, 2007, an undercover police officer in a bar in Westhampton Beach in Suffolk County observed a suspect hand a knotted clear plastic bag containing a white powdery substance to another person and in return he was given cash money. They then separated and left the bar. Since the officer had witnessed the sale of the suspected narcotic, he had other officers stop the truck of the buyer and they recovered the drugs which proved under testing to be cocaine. The buyer was arrested for cocaine possession, according to a New York Drug Crime Lawyer.

The buyer then agreed to testify against the seller. Around two hours later, the seller was arrested. At the time of his arrest, he was not in possession of cocaine or any other drugs. The seller was arrested and charged with criminal sale of a controlled substance in the third degree and criminal possession of a controlled substance in the third degree. In return for his testimony against the seller, the buyer’s criminal charges were dismissed.

Prior to court, the prosecutor asked the judge if he could get permission to ask the buyer on the stand in court if he had purchased drugs from that seller in the past. He argued that since he had been a regular customer of the seller that it would clear up any questions as to the “absence of mistake.” In other words, it would ensure that the defense could not say that the buyer was mistaken about the identity of the person who had sold him the drugs, explained a Queens Drug Possession Lawyer. If the buyer knew the seller, there is no “absence of mistake.” The defense counsel opposed the motion. He claimed that the seller was not going to claim that the buyer had made a mistake about naming him, but that the buyer was simply lying and that he had never sold the man drugs in the first place.

A New York Criminal Lawyer explained that the judge originally told the prosecutor that he would not be allowed to ask the buyer any questions about previous sales. However, he told both lawyers that it was possible that additional testimony could change that ruling. In court the following date, the defense attorney questioned the buyer about his knowledge of the severity of the charges. The prosecutor again made the motion to bring in the prior sales stating that the defense attorney had opened the door to that line of questioning. Consequently, the buyer admitted to purchasing drugs from the seller on at least ten prior occasions.

The court found him guilty and he appealed. On appeal the Supreme Court reversed the decision on a matter of law since the prior transaction testimony served no purpose and was prejudicial. A new trial was ordered.

A Nassau County Drug Possession Lawyer can explain that issues of law are constantly changing. A person who is not specifically trained in the law cannot begin to know what all of their rights are without the assistance of a professional. Here at Steven Bilkis and Associates, we have a complete legal team to serve you. Our legal counsel will stand by you and ensure that your rights are protected. Our legal team can argue your side and make sure that you and your loved ones are considered. We make sure that you are defended to protect your rights.

Stephen Bilkis & Associates with its Criminal law Lawyers has convenient offices throughout the New York Metropolitan area including other areas of New York. Our Drug Crime Attorneys can provide you with advice to guide you through difficult situations. Without skilled counsel you could lose precious compensation to help with your defense. You and your loved ones will need advice following such a frightening experience. This is true even if the attorney for the other side has not adequately made their case. Let us help you to recover from the devastation that has befallen your family. If you are ever arrested for a drug related crime, we are here to help.

There has been one more arrest in the case of an attempted home invasion that ended with the death of one would-be burglar and the wounding of another, police sources told NY Criminal Lawyers.
Suffolk police investigators found a fourth man involved in the attempted home invasion – a 25-year-old man from Mattituck, who was subsequently arrested. He was charged with first-degree burglary.
NY Criminal Lawyers do not yet know how the police found the latest suspect or how he specifically participated in the attempted burglary. According to police sources, they believed only three men to have been involved in the April 13 incident.
One of the burglars shot a pit bull in the house with a .22-caliber rifle. Then, a resident shot the burglar, killing him. The resident had a permit for the shotgun and no charges have been filed against him. The dog is expected to recover.
The resident also shot another burglar, a 25-year-old man from Mastic. The wounded burglar was taken to Southside Hospital and listed in critical condition. Further details on his condition are unavailable.
The third burglar, a 27-year-old man from Aquebogue, escaped the scene but was soon caught, police sources explained to NY Criminal Lawyers. He was charged with first-degree burglary, and held on $1 million bail after his arraignment. A deputy bureau chief requested that amount due to the third burglar’s previous activities.
Records showed that the third burglar had already been arrested on drug charges, possession of stolen property and criminal mischief. Two of the charges earned him probation and time served. It is not certain what happened with the third charge. In Brooklyn and Queens, Drug Possession would be one of the more serious charges.
The burglar who died in the attempt had already served time in New York and New Jersey and had been arrested for other burglaries in Suffolk County in 2003. He was released in December 2007, police sources indicated to NY Criminal Lawyers, only to be arrested again in 2008 for failing to report to his parole officer. He had been released early, so was force to serve the final two months of his sentence.

Continue reading "Another Home Invasion Arrest" »

A pair of Brooklyn bandits held up a pizzeria in Williamsburg.
The perpetrators, wearing masks and armed with guns, entered a Papa John’s on Grand Street near Leonard Street at 10 p.m. One of the robbers drew a silver pistol and forced the 18-year-old working the counter to open the register, cops told New York Criminal Lawyers.
The thieves took an undisclosed amount of cash, then ordered the worker to give them what he had, taking his cash and his iPhone, police added.
There are several stories out of Staten Island New York Criminal Lawyers are currently investigating.
The first is of a suspected drug dealer murdered in his car as he drove through Port Richmond. The 26-year-old victim was driving a 2003 Infiniti coup when he was shot through the open window of his car below the left eye at 2:39 a.m. on Harrison Avenue near Castleton Avenue.
The victim had been in trouble with the law before for drug-related issues and was caught in a 2008 prosecution sting. He was pronounced dead at the scene. Drug Possession in Brooklyn and Queens is treated very seriously by law enforcement.
In West Brighton, an ex-con shot up a rival’s car in a drive-by.
The 20-year-old ex-con shot at his enemy’s PT Cruiser as it was parked on Delafield Avenue near Broadway at 8:15 in the evening. The flurry of bullets broke four windows and put a hole in the body of the car.
The shooter was found in his home two hours later, armed with a semi-automatic weapon and listening to an NYPD radio that had been previously reported stolen. He was already on parole after a year in prison for shooting a man in the leg in 2008 at a movie theater.
Finally, a man in Midland Beach was arrested, thanks to a weapon found in his car.
Officers pulled the 36-year-old man for his illegally-tinted windows, when they found the Glock with 34 ammo cartridges in the car. He told the police he was going fishing, but he may actually end up in jail instead, police told New York Criminal Lawyers.

Continue reading "More Crimes from the Blotter" »

A drug pusher may have been one of the few Americans to actually benefit from the events of September 11, 2001, New York Criminal Lawyers have learned. But now, his luck has run out.
The drug dealer may have already been in prison but for the fact that the evidence gathered against him happened to be in the World Trade Center on 9/11. Now another charge has surfaced and he will serve a five-year sentence for bail jumping – something he did more than 16 years ago, in an appeals court ruling.
Back in 1994, the deal was already on probation when he was arrested for allegedly being one of the men behind a crack ring in the Bronx. He was allowed to go on $200,000 bail, then went into hiding. In order to stay hidden, he even burned off his own fingerprints, sources have stated.
He was caught for drug dealing in 2007 and was sentenced to 151 months in prison. It was at that time he pleaded guilty to bail jumping in order to get a deal that would limit his stay in prison to no more than two years.
The judge wasn’t going for that, however. He claimed the bail jumper had made a “mockery of the constitutional right to bail” and made sure he got more than twice the two years – five years in total.
An appeal was made, but the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan upheld the decision.
In other news, a fight between a former student and a school aide near a middle school in Queens resulted in hospitalization for one person and a sprained ankle for a dean who attempted to break up the fight, sources have revealed to New York Criminal Lawyers.
The argument between the two women started inside the school and moved outside, where their confrontation turned violent. During the fistfight on the playground, the dean attempted to intervene, but fell down as the others continued to fight.
Both of the fighters were arrested and charges are still pending.
One of the combatants was taken to the hospital, bleeding from the head. Authorities told N York Criminal Lawyers that none of the wounds were serious.

Continue reading "Two Stories of Crime in New York" »

Former French Open champion Yannick Noah is not fazed that his son Joakim was arrested for possession of marijuana and having an open cup of some sort of alcohol on his person.

The NBA forward and former Florida Gator star was arrested Sunday in Gainesville, Florida. A policeman saw him on a sidewalk holding a plastic cup. After taking Noah to the station they searched him and discovered that he had some marijuana in his pocket.

Yannick Noah didn't see what the big deal was. He was asked his opinion as he attended The French Open and said he saw nothing wrong with having a beer on the street.

Yannick has already stated years ago that he has used marijuana. His admission created quite a stir and a magazine printed the story. This is after he won the French Open Title.

Joakim Noah was notified that he would have to return and appear before a judge. This is not an unusual procedure for such offenses. He could face a significant time in jail and a monetary fine for the marijuana charge.

Noah had a lawyer to defend his position and obtain bail for him. If you are arressted for in Queens County, you should hire an experienced Queens Criminal Lawyer. Without an experienced Queens Criminal Attorney you could jeopardize your rights.

Joakim Noah led the University of Florida to consecutive U.S. college basketball championships before being picked ninth by the Bulls in last year's NBA Draft

Continue reading "Legend Noah Not Fazed by Son's Arrest If your child is arrested in Quenns County hire a good Queens Criminal Defense Lawyer " »