Opinion
No. 570155/18
03-20-2023
The People of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Joel Melendez, Defendant-Appellant.
Unpublished Opinion
MOTION DECISION
PRESENT: Tisch, J.P., Michael, James, JJ.
Defendant appeals from a judgment of the Criminal Court of the City of New York, Bronx County (Bahaati E. Pitt, J.), rendered December 6, 2017, convicting him, upon a plea of guilty, of criminal possession of stolen property in the fifth degree, and imposing sentence.
PER CURIAM.
Judgment of conviction (Bahaati E. Pitt, J.), rendered December 6, 2017, affirmed.
Since defendant waived prosecution by information, the accusatory instrument is assessed under the reasonable cause standard applicable to a misdemeanor complaint (see People v Dumay, 23 N.Y.3d 518, 522 [2014]). So viewed, the accusatory instrument was jurisdictionally valid because it described facts of an evidentiary nature establishing reasonable cause to believe that defendant was guilty of fifth-degree criminal possession of stolen property (see Penal Law § 165.40). Allegations that police recovered from defendant's waistband four checks written by Dionicio Burgos to four different companies, and that Burgos did not give defendant permission or authority to take, remove or exercise control over such property, supplied "defendant with sufficient notice of the charged crime to satisfy the demands of due process and double jeopardy" (People v Dreyden, 15 N.Y.3d 100, 103 [2010]; see also People v Garcia, 290 A.D.2d 299 [2002], lv denied 98 N.Y.2d 730 [2002]; People v Martinez, 22 Misc.3d 131 [A], 2009 NY Slip Op 50138[U][App Term, 1st Dept 2009]). Defendant's contention that the instrument fails to allege facts indicating that he knew the checks were stolen ignores the inferences that can be drawn from his exclusive possession of four checks of which he was neither the payor nor payee, without authority from the owner of said checks (see People v Starks, 70 A.D.3d 585 [2010], lv denied 15 N.Y.3d 757 [2010] ["defendant's knowledge that property is stolen may be proven circumstantially, and the unexplained or falsely explained recent exclusive possession of the fruits of a crime allows a [trier of fact] to draw a permissible inference that defendant knew the property was stolen"]; People v Landfair, 191 A.D.2d 825, 826 [1993], lv denied 81 N.Y.2d 1015 [1993]).