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THE HOSPITAL FROM WHICH LAPTOPS WERE STOLEN WAS NOT A “DWELLING” WITHIN THE MEANING OF THE BURGLARY STATUTE (FIRST DEPT).

The First Department, reversing two of defendant’s burglary convictions, determined the hospital from which laptops were stolen was not a “dwelling” as that term is used in the burglary statutes:

Defendant’s convictions under counts three and four of the indictment, regarding the 2017 thefts of laptop computers from the Physicians & Surgeons Building at Columbia University Medical Center, were not supported by legally sufficient evidence of the “dwelling” element of burglary in the second degree (see Penal Law § 140.00[3]). There was no evidence that patients stayed overnight in this building. The People’s reliance on Penal Law § 140.00(2) is unavailing, because no “unit” within the building is a dwelling. Although the building was part of a large campus covering several blocks, there was insufficient evidence that this building provided defendant with ready access via connecting elevators, stairwells, or corridors to other buildings, where hospital patients stayed overnight and which was, in any event, at a considerable distance … . People v Brown, 2022 NY Slip Op 02205, First Dept 3-31-22

​Practice Point: Here a hospital from which laptops had been stolen was not a “dwelling” as that term is used in the burglary statutes.

 

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