Opinion
October 28, 1999
Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Jeffrey Atlas, J.).
Defendant claims that he received ineffective assistance of counsel as a result of counsel's advice to defendant to plead guilty rather than pursue a defense of extreme emotional disturbance ( Penal Law § 125.25[1][a]). This type of ineffective assistance claim would require a CPL 440.10 motion in order to amplify the record as to the nature of the advice rendered to defendant and as to counsel's strategic analysis of the case underlying such advice (People v. Love, 57 N.Y.2d 998; People v. Harris, 109 A.D.2d 351, 360). On the existing record, we conclude that defendant has not established "the absence of strategic or other legitimate explanations" for counsel's conduct (People v. Rivera, 71 N.Y.2d 705, 709), and find that defendant received meaningful representation (see, People v. Ford, 86 N.Y.2d 397, 404). The defense psychologist's report, when viewed against the factual background, does not establish a viable defense of extreme emotional disturbance. Contrary to defendant's contention, he received a favorable plea arrangement given that he faced a sentence of life without parole in the event of a conviction after trial on one of the first-degree murder counts.
The record, read as a whole, establishes that defendant abandoned his application to withdraw his guilty plea. In any event, defendant had offered only conclusory assertions of having been "pressured" into entering the plea, and these assertions were belied by the transcript of the plea allocution, which clearly establishes that his decision was knowing and voluntary.
We have considered and rejected defendant's remaining claims.
ELLERIN, P.J., NARDELLI, LERNER, ANDRIAS, FRIEDMAN, JJ.