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THE JUDGE’S REFUSAL TO HOLD A PRE-TRIAL HUNTLEY HEARING ON THE VOLUNTARINESS OF DEFENDANT’S STATEMENTS WAS REVERSIBLE ERROR (FOURTH DEPT).

The Fourth Department, reversing defendant’s conviction, determined the judge’s refusal to hold a Huntley hearing to determine the voluntariness of defendant’s statements until several witnesses testified at trial was reversible error:

“When [a] motion [to suppress evidence] is made before trial, the trial may not be commenced until determination of the motion” (CPL 710.40 [3] …). Here, defendant moved to suppress his statements to the police on the ground that they were involuntarily made (see CPL 710.20 [3]), but the court did not rule on the motion prior to trial and repeatedly refused to conduct a pretrial Huntley hearing, even after the People requested a Huntley hearing at the outset of the trial. Instead, the court granted the People’s request for a Huntley hearing over defendant’s objection after nine of the ten prosecution witnesses had already testified. Following that hearing, the court found the statements to be voluntary and thus admissible.

The error is not harmless. It is well established that, “unless the proof of the defendant’s guilt, without reference to the error, is overwhelming, there is no occasion for consideration of any doctrine of harmless error” … . Here, the evidence was not overwhelming … . The central factual question in this case was identity. The evidence of identity was that defendant was apprehended coming out of a building located on the block towards which the culprit had been seen running, he fit the description of the culprit, and he was identified by three eyewitnesses after a showup procedure. On the other hand, defendant did not have in his possession the fruits of the crime or the firearm used in the crime, nor was he dressed like the culprit. Moreover, showup identification procedures are inherently suggestive … , and the culprit had been wearing a partial face covering at the time of the crime, which further undermined the reliability of the identifications … . People v Coffie, 2021 NY Slip Op 01884, Fourth Dept 3-26-21

 

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