WHERE THE INDICTMENT ALLEGES MORE THAN ONE WAY TO COMMIT THE CHARGED OFFENSE, THE PEOPLE NEED ONLY PROVE ONE (SECOND DEPT).
The Second Department noted that the People are not required to prove all of the ways the indictment alleged the crime was committed. The People need only prove one:
” Where an offense may be committed by doing any one of several things, the indictment may, in a single count, group them together and charge the defendant with having committed them all, and a conviction may be had on proof of the commission of any one of the things, without proof of the commission of the others'”… . Therefore, where ” the indictment charge[s] more than the People [are] required to prove under the statute,'” they are not required to prove that the defendant committed each of the charged acts … . Accordingly, the fact that the indictment charged the defendant with committing burglary in the third degree by both unlawfully entering and remaining in the subject premises did not require the People to prove both sets of facts and, since they proceeded only on the theory of unlawful entry, the Supreme Court properly instructed the jury on that theory only. People v Bynum. 2019 NY Slip Op 03067, Second dept 4-24-19
