Opinion
March 8, 1971
Appeal by defendant from a judgment of the Supreme Court, Queens County, rendered April 19, 1968, convicting him of injury to property as a misdemeanor (former Penal Law, § 1433, subd. 2), after a nonjury trial, and sentencing him to a term of six months in the New York City Reformatory, with execution of sentence suspended. Judgment reversed, on the law and the facts, and indictment dismissed. Since the evidence adduced at the trial indicates that defendant set fire to an abandoned barge, the trial court erred in finding him guilty of injury to property as a misdemeanor, in the absence of proof of ownership in someone other than defendant, which is a material element of the crime. The People must aver and prove that the property allegedly destroyed or injured was that of another (former Penal Law, § 1433, subd. 2; cf. People v. Reade, 247 App. Div. 376; Potter v. Bierwirth, 171 App. Div. 175; People v. Horr, 7 Barb. 9). Munder, Acting P.J., Martuscello, Shapiro, Gulotta and Benjamin, JJ., concur.