| People v Wannamaker |
| 2012 NY Slip Op 01572 [93 AD3d 426] |
| March 1, 2012 |
| Appellate Division, First Department |
| The People of the State of New York,Respondent, v Christian Wannamaker, Appellant. |
—[*1] Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., District Attorney, New York (Matthew T. Murphy of counsel), forrespondent.
Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Rena K. Uviller, J.), rendered October 13,2010, convicting defendant, upon his plea of guilty, of criminal possession of a controlledsubstance in the fifth degree, and sentencing him, as a second felony drug offender, to a term of1½ years, unanimously affirmed.
The court properly denied defendant's suppression motion. Police officers were on anticrimepatrol at a highly crime-prone and drug-prone public housing project. The officers were acting,among other things, as custodians of the New York City Housing Authority buildings, whichincludes keeping these buildings free of trespassers (see People v Williams, 16 AD3d 151 [2005], lv denied 5NY3d 771 [2005]).
The police saw defendant enter one of the project's buildings, which was barred totrespassers. Defendant entered through a door that had a broken lock, went upstairs, and returnedto the lobby after only two or three minutes. While this conduct may have had innocentexplanations, an officer also believed defendant looked familiar, perhaps from a wanted poster ora trespass program.
Accordingly, based on the totality of the above-described circumstances, the police had anobjective, credible reason for approaching defendant and asking him if he was a resident orvisitor (see e.g. People vHendricks, 43 AD3d 361, 363 [2007]; People v Anderson, 306 AD2d 54 [2003],lv denied 100 NY2d 578 [2003]; People v Tinort, 272 AD2d 206 [2000], lvdenied 95 NY2d 872 [2000]). This brief questioning about defendant's reason for being inthe building did not go beyond the bounds of a request for information, and we reject defendant'sarguments to the contrary (see People v Hollman, 79 NY2d 181, 190-192 [1992]).
Defendant told the officers he had been attempting to visit a particular person in a particularapartment, who was not home. At this point, it was reasonable to momentarily and nonforciblydetain defendant while one of the officers verified the information defendant provided (seePeople v Reyes, 83 NY2d 945 [1994], cert denied 513 US 991 [1994]; People vBora, 83 NY2d 531, 535-536 [1994]), particularly since the name defendant supplied seemedpossibly fictitious. In any event, the detention did not produce an incriminating response or otherevidence. Instead, the police only made an inquiry to a third party, the occupant of the apartment[*2]defendant claimed to have attempted to visit (see People v Lozado, 90 AD3d582 [2011]). When the occupant's response made it clear that defendant's explanation for hispresence was completely false, the police had probable cause to arrest him for criminal trespass.Concur—Tom, J.P., Friedman, Acosta, DeGrasse and Román, JJ.