| People v Perez |
| 2012 NY Slip Op 00228 [91 AD3d 673] |
| Jnury 10, 2012 |
| Appellate Division, Second Department |
| The People of the State of New York,Respondent, v Carlos Perez, Appellant. |
—[*1] Charles J. Hynes, District Attorney, Brooklyn, N.Y. (Leonard Joblove, Camille O'HaraGillespie, and W. Rudolph Kleysteuber of counsel), for respondent.
Appeal by the defendant from a judgment of the Supreme Court, Kings County (Del Guidice,J.), rendered March 8, 2010, convicting him of burglary in the second degree, upon a jury verdict,and imposing sentence.
Ordered that the judgment is affirmed.
The two complainants saw the defendant carrying their laptop computers and other itemswhile the defendant was leaving the apartment building in which one of the complainantsresided. The complainants followed the defendant and retrieved their property from him. Theywere both able to view the defendant from several feet away. They also both immediately pickedthe defendant out of separate lineups.
At trial, defense counsel challenged a police sergeant's ability to remember a description ofeverything the complainants had told him after he responded to the scene of the crime. Onredirect examination, the prosecutor asked the sergeant to state how one of the complainantsdescribed the defendant. The Supreme Court allowed the sergeant to answer over the defendant'sobjection. The jury ultimately found the defendant guilty of burglary in the second degree.
Contrary to the defendant's contention, the testimony elicited from the sergeant on redirectexamination was not inadmissible hearsay, since it was not offered for the truth of the matterasserted, but only to establish the sergeant's ability to remember the description given by thecomplainant (see People v Huertas, 75 NY2d 487, 492 [1990]).
The defendant was not deprived of the effective assistance of counsel, as defense counselprovided meaningful representation (see People v Benevento, 91 NY2d 708 [1998];People v Baldi, 54 NY2d 137 [1981]). Skelos, J.P., Hall, Austin and Miller, JJ., concur.