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AMENDMENT OF INDICTMENTS CHARGING A COURSE OF SEXUAL CONDUCT TO CHARGES WHICH REQUIRE A UNANIMOUS VERDICT WITH RESPECT TO A PARTICULAR ACT DEPRIVED DEFENDANT OF HIS RIGHT TO BE TRIED ONLY ON THE CRIMES CHARGED.

The Fourth Department, reversing defendant’s convictions, determined the indictments were improperly amended after trial:

We agree with defendant … that the court erred in granting the People’s motion to amend the indictments at the close of proof. The fact that defendant consented to the amendments is of no moment because he has ” a fundamental and nonwaivable right to be tried only on the crimes charged’ ” … . “An indictment may not be amended in any respect which changes the theory or theories of the prosecution as reflected in the evidence before the grand jury which filed it” … . Unlike the crimes charged in the amended indictments, the crimes of course of sexual conduct against a child in the first degree and predatory sexual assault against a child based upon allegations that defendant committed a course of sexual conduct against a child in the first degree as charged in the initial indictments do not criminalize a specific act, and thus do not require jury unanimity with respect to a specific act … . For that reason, we conclude that the amendments of the indictments “resulted in an impermissible substantive change in the indictment[s] by adding new counts that changed the theory of the prosecution” … . We therefore reverse the judgments insofar as they convicted defendant on those counts, and dismiss those counts of the amended indictments without prejudice to the People to re-present any appropriate charges under those counts to another grand jury. People v Vickers, 2017 NY Slip Op 02183, 4th Dept 3-24-17

CRIMINAL LAW (AMENDMENT OF INDICTMENTS CHARGING A COURSE OF SEXUAL CONDUCT TO CHARGES WHICH REQUIRE A UNANIMOUS VERDICT WITH RESPECT TO A PARTICULAR ACT DEPRIVED DEFENDANT OF HIS RIGHT TO BE TRIED ONLY ON THE CRIMES CHARGED)/INDICTMENT, AMENDMENT OF (AMENDMENT OF INDICTMENTS CHARGING A COURSE OF SEXUAL CONDUCT TO CHARGES WHICH REQUIRE A UNANIMOUS VERDICT WITH RESPECT TO A PARTICULAR ACT DEPRIVED DEFENDANT OF HIS RIGHT TO BE TRIED ONLY ON THE CRIMES CHARGED)

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