People v Ebanks

2009 NY Slip Op 01713 [60 AD3d 462]

March 10, 2009

Appellate Division, First Department

As corrected through Wednesday, May 6, 2009

The People of the State of New York,Respondent, v Stuart Ebanks, Appellant.

—[*1]Office of the Appellate Defender, New York (Richard M. Greenberg of counsel), forappellant.

Robert T. Johnson, District Attorney, Bronx (Jennifer Marinaccio of counsel), forrespondent.

Judgment, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Judith S. Lieb, J.), rendered January 11, 2006,convicting defendant, after a jury trial, of aggravated criminal contempt, criminal contempt inthe first degree (two counts), and stalking in the third degree, and sentencing him to an aggregateterm of 32/3 to 11 years, unanimously affirmed.

The court properly exercised its discretion in permitting the People to introduce evidence ofuncharged crimes that were probative of defendant's motive and intent and provided backgroundinformation explaining the sequence of events and the relationship between defendant and thevictim (see e.g. People v Steinberg, 170 AD2d 50, 72-74 [1991], affd 79NY2d 673 [1992]). Unlike evidence of general criminal propensity, evidence that a particularvictim was the focus of a defendant's continuing aggression may be highly relevant (seePeople v Bierenbaum, 301 AD2d 119, 150 [2002], lv denied 99 NY2d 626 [2003],cert denied 540 US 821 [2003]), and the People "were not bound to stop after presentingminimum evidence" (People v Alvino, 71 NY2d 233, 245 [1987]). The probative valueof this evidence outweighed any prejudicial effect, which was minimized by the court's suitablelimiting instructions. Defendant's constitutional argument is both unpreserved and without merit(see People v Pettaway, 30 AD3d257 [2006], lv denied 7 NY3d 816 [2006]).

Defendant's argument, including his constitutional claim, that the court should have provideda remedy, beyond the inquiry it conducted, for his assertion that the police improperly destroyedallegedly exculpatory evidence is unpreserved and we decline to review it in the [*2]interest of justice. As an alternative holding, we also reject it on themerits.

We perceive no basis for reducing the sentence. Concur—Mazzarelli, J.P., Saxe,Nardelli, DeGrasse and Freedman, JJ.