Matter of Woodard v Prack
2009 NY Slip Op 05666 [64 AD3d 842]
July 2, 2009
Appellate Division, Third Department
As corrected through Wednesday, September 2, 2009


In the Matter of Victor Woodard, Petitioner, v Albert Prack, asDirector of Special Housing and Inmate Disciplinary Programs,Respondent.

[*1]Victor Woodard, Auburn, petitioner pro se.

Andrew M. Cuomo, Attorney General, Albany (Peter H. Schiff of counsel), forrespondent.

Proceeding pursuant to CPLR article 78 (transferred to this Court by order of the SupremeCourt, entered in Albany County) to review a determination of the Commissioner of CorrectionalServices which found petitioner guilty of violating a prison disciplinary rule.

At the conclusion of a tier III prison disciplinary hearing, petitioner was found guilty ofmaking threats. That determination, which was affirmed upon administrative appeal, was basedupon a threatening letter which was found to have been authored by petitioner. This CPLRarticle 78 proceeding seeking annulment ensued.

We confirm. The misbehavior report and corroborating hearing testimony, together with thecomparison of the offending letter and exemplars of petitioner's handwriting, provide substantialevidence to support the determination of guilt (see Matter of Koehl v Fischer, 52 AD3d 1070, 1071 [2008],appeal dismissed 11 NY3d 809 [2008]). Petitioner's claim that the Hearing Officer failedto perform an independent handwriting analysis is wholly belied by the record.

Cardona, P.J., Rose, Lahtinen, Kavanagh and Stein, JJ., concur. Adjudged that thedetermination is confirmed, without costs, and petition dismissed.


NYPTI Decisions © 2026 is a project of New York Prosecutors Training Institute (NYPTI) made possible by leveraging the work we've done providing online research and tools to prosecutors.

NYPTI would like to thank New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services, New York State Senate's Open Legislation Project, New York State Unified Court System, New York State Law Reporting Bureau and Free Law Project for their invaluable assistance making this project possible.

Install the free RECAP extensions to help contribute to this archive. See https://free.law/recap/ for more information.