INDICTMENT COUNT CHARGING 20 INDIVIDUAL INSTANCES OF CONTEMPT WAS DUPLICITOUS, CONVICTION REVERSED (FIRST DEPT).
The First Department, reversing defendant’s conviction, determined the indictment which charged 20 individual crimes (contempt) in a single count was duplicitous:
The criminal contempt count was duplicitous because defendant’s acts of violating an order of protection by regularly but briefly showing up at the victim’s apartment, over the course of about a month and 20 days, constituted distinct crimes that were required to be alleged in separate counts … .
Defendant preserved this argument by moving to dismiss that count on the same ground in his omnibus motion, which the court denied … and we find the People’s arguments on the issue of preservation unavailing. The defect was in the language of the indictment itself, and it did not depend on the trial evidence or the court’s charge. People v Villalon, 2018 NY Slip Op 03431, First Dept 5-10-18
CRIMINAL LAW (INDICTMENT COUNT CHARGING 20 INDIVIDUAL INSTANCES OF CONTEMPT WAS DUPLICITOUS, CONVICTION REVERSED (FIRST DEPT))/DUPLICITOUS (CRIMINAL LAW, INDICTMENT COUNT CHARGING 20 INDIVIDUAL INSTANCES OF CONTEMPT WAS DUPLICITOUS, CONVICTION REVERSED (FIRST DEPT))/INDICTMENTS (DUPLICITOUS, INDICTMENT COUNT CHARGING 20 INDIVIDUAL INSTANCES OF CONTEMPT WAS DUPLICITOUS, CONVICTION REVERSED (FIRST DEPT))