| People v Griffin |
| 2009 NY Slip Op 05392 [63 AD3d 635] |
| June 30, 2009 |
| Appellate Division, First Department |
| The People of the State of New York,Respondent, v Anthony Griffin, Appellant. |
—[*1] Robert T. Johnson, District Attorney, Bronx (Jennifer Marinaccio of counsel), forrespondent.
Judgment, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Martin Marcus, J.), rendered October 24, 2006,convicting defendant, after a jury trial, of murder in the second degree and sentencing him to aterm of 25 years to life, unanimously affirmed.
On October 21, 2002, Ariann Jackson returned to her apartment from work to find thelifeless body of Chauncey Warren, her 23-year-old boyfriend who had been stabbed to death.Although defendant was indicted for the crime on theories that included the commission of thehomicidal act while acting in concert with another, the case was presented to the jury on thetheory that it was defendant himself who fatally stabbed Warren. Defendant asserts on thisappeal that his conviction was against the weight of the evidence.
At trial, the People presented evidence that Warren had been very close with his uncle,Lester Dixon, and lived with him in 2001. Dixon knew defendant as a person his nephew grewup with. In the summer of 2002, Dixon learned that Warren was having a problem with theMurder Unit, a group of neighborhood drug dealers. The problem stemmed from the group'ssuspicion that Warren had slashed the face of someone named Jason. Accompanied by his uncle,Warren met with and explained to the Murder Unit that it was defendant and not he whocommitted the assault. The Murder Unit instructed Warren to notify them as soon as he sawdefendant. On the way home, Warren met an acquaintance whom he told about the encounterwith the Murder Unit and their instruction for him to deliver defendant up to them.
For about a year before his death, Warren lived with Jackson in her first-floor apartment.Jackson's mother, Britt Minott, and her stepfather, Nathaniel Mouzon, lived in an apartment onthe second floor of the building. In keeping with her weekly routine, Jackson thoroughly cleanedthe apartment, including the bathroom sink and mirror, on Sunday, October 20, 2002, the daybefore the murder. The next day, Jackson left at 7:30 a.m. to go to work, leaving Warren at theapartment. Warren had to go to court that day to appear on a summons. At about 10:30 a.m.,defendant and another man approached Mouzon in front of the building and said they werelooking for Warren. Mouzon rang Warren's doorbell and got no response. The two men waitedoutside until Warren returned about half an hour later. At that time Warren entered his apartmentwith defendant and the other visitor. At about 1:00 p.m., Warren unlocked the door to allow[*2]Mouzon access to an electrical outlet for a power tool he wasusing to fix a lock in the hallway. Upon entering the apartment, Mouzon saw Warren and theother man in the living room and heard someone else playing video games. Mouzon finishedusing the outlet at 1:40 p.m. when he believed Warren locked the door. At about 3:00 p.m.,Mouzon and Minott went to a check-cashing establishment and returned to the building 10minutes later. Mouzon, who had been in the hallway outside of Warren's door or in front of thebuilding for the entire day up to that point, did not see defendant or the other visitor leaveWarren's apartment.
Shortly after 6:20 p.m., Jackson returned to her apartment to find the front door unlocked.She then saw Warren's dead body in the living room with a very deep cut in the neck. Theapartment had been ransacked and Warren's pinky ring, chain and a Play Station video gamesystem were missing. The kitchen window, which led to a back alley fire escape, was open.Flower pots by the window were in disarray and there was blood on the curtain.
Jackson never again stayed at the apartment, but returned to it on November 13 with Mouzonand Minott to retrieve some of her clothing. At that time, Jackson noticed a plastic bagcontaining a football jersey and a grey hooded sweatshirt. Both garments were bloodstained andneither belonged to Warren or Jackson. Jackson, however, remembered seeing defendantwearing the sweatshirt when she and Warren encountered him in the street two days before themurder. After receiving a call from Jackson, Detective Robert D'Amico took possession of andvouchered both items of clothing, which were later tested for DNA.
An autopsy revealed that Warren, who was considerably larger than defendant, suffered acombination of 21 stab wounds and slashes to his body. Among the wounds were three deep stabwounds to the neck, which perforated jugular veins, and two stab wounds to the right and leftsides of the back, which respectively caused the chest cavity to fill with blood and the left lungto collapse. Dr. James Gill of the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner opined that each of thesefive wounds was potentially fatal in itself, and the stab wounds to the back occurred first.
During the course of the investigation, a fingerprint lifted from the bathroom mirror wasmatched to defendant. On May 5, 2003, D'Amico interviewed defendant in North Carolina. Afterwaiving his Miranda rights, defendant stated that he had traveled to New York fromNorth Carolina around October 21, 2002. Over the following week, defendant and Warren saweach other every day, often playing video games at Warren's apartment. Defendant also toldD'Amico that the Murder Unit was looking for him and had issued a $20,000 "hit" on himbecause of Jason's slashing. Defendant said he thought Warren might have told someone that hewas back in New York. Pursuant to a search warrant, D'Amico took four swabs of saliva fromdefendant's mouth for DNA testing. The samples were secured and brought to New York forlaboratory analysis.
Dr. Mechthild Prinz, the Director of the Department of Forensic Biology of the Office of theChief Medical Examiner, testified that the saliva samples recovered from defendant were used tocreate a DNA profile of him. Similarly, a DNA profile of Warren was created from a sample ofhis blood. DNA profiles of bloodstains on the jersey and the hooded sweatshirt matched Warren.The sweatshirt was also turned inside out and scraped for skin cells in the areas of the neck andarmpits. Dr. Prinz opined that the armpit DNA profile did not come from Warren, but wasconsistent with defendant's DNA profile.
At the prosecution's request, the case was not submitted to the jury on an acting-in-concerttheory. Rather, the jury was instructed that the prosecution had to prove defendant causedWarren's death and did so by stabbing and slashing him with a sharp object. Defendant [*3]asserts that in this circumstantial evidence case his conviction ofsecond degree intentional murder is against the weight of evidence.
Our weight-of-evidence review requires us first to determine whether an acquittal would nothave been unreasonable. If so, we must next weigh conflicting testimony, review any rationalinferences that may be drawn from the evidence and evaluate the strength of such conclusions.Then, based on the weight of the credible evidence, we must next decide whether the jury wasjustified in finding defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt (People v Danielson, 9NY3d 342, 348 [2007]). In conducting the required analysis, based upon the evidence adduced attrial, we determine that an acquittal of the charge of second-degree intentional murder on asole-actor theory would have been unreasonable. Even if a contrary conclusion would have beenreasonable, we conclude that the verdict was not against the weight of the credible evidence. Asnoted above, testimony at trial placed defendant at Warren's apartment during a period when thecrime could have been committed. The DNA analyses of the bloodstains and armpit skin cellsfound on the gray hooded sweatshirt provided a compelling link between defendant and thestabbing. Defendant's attack on the credibility of Jackson's testimony that she saw him wearingthe sweatshirt shortly before the murder is unavailing. Under a weight-of-evidence analysis, acourt does not take the place of the jury in passing on questions of the reliability of witnesses andthe credibility of testimony, instead it gives great deference to the jury's findings (see Peoplev Romero, 7 NY3d 633, 642, 643 [2006]). As indicated above, it was determined that thefatal wounds to Warren's back were the first to be inflicted. This factor, considered inconjunction with the element of surprise, suffices to allow the jury to discount Warren'srelatively larger size as a basis for a reasonable doubt that defendant acted alone. Accordingly,the record amply supports the jury's conclusion that defendant himself committed the homicidalact. To the extent defendant is challenging the legal sufficiency of the evidence, that claim hasnot been preserved, inasmuch as his trial motion to dismiss was based on a different ground(see People v Wells, 53 AD3d 181, 188-189 [2008], lv denied 11 NY3d 858[2008]; People v Crawford, 38 AD3d 680 [2007], lv denied 9 NY3d 842 [2007]).We decline to reach the issue in the interest of justice. As an alternative holding, we also reject iton the merits. Concur—Tom, J.P., Andrias, Nardelli, Buckley and DeGrasse, JJ.