People v Lucca
2018 NY Slip Op 06486 [165 AD3d 414]
October 2, 2018
Appellate Division, First Department
As corrected through Wednesday, November 28, 2018


[*1]
 The People of the State of New York,Respondent,
v
Joel Lucca, Appellant.

Robert S. Dean, Center for Appellate Litigation, New York (John Vang of counsel), forappellant.

Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., District Attorney, New York (Megan DeMarco of counsel), forrespondent.

Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Ellen N. Biben, J.), rendered April 19, 2016,convicting defendant, after a jury trial, of five counts of criminal possession of a forgedinstrument in the second degree, and sentencing him, as a second felony offender, to an aggregateterm of 31/2 to 7 years, unanimously affirmed.

The court properly denied defendant's application pursuant to Batson v Kentucky(476 US 79 [1986]). The record supports the court's finding that the nondiscriminatory reasonsprovided by the prosecutor for the challenges in question, which were based on concerns that thepanelists might have unfavorable attitudes toward law enforcement, were not pretextual. Thisfinding is entitled to great deference (seePeople v Hecker, 15 NY3d 625, 656-657 [2010]; People v Hernandez, 75 NY2d350 [1990], affd 500 US 352 [1991]). Defendant failed to preserve his claim of disparatetreatment by the prosecutor of similarly situated panelists (see People v Cunningham, 21 AD3d 746, 748-749 [1st Dept 2005],lv dismissed 6 NY3d 775 [2006]), and we decline to review it in the interest of justice.As an alternative holding, we find that it is not supported by the record.

Defendant did not preserve his claim that counterfeit spectator tickets fall outside the scopeof Penal Law § 170.10 (1), and we decline to review it in the interest of justice.

We perceive no basis for reducing the sentence. Concur—Renwick, J.P., Gische,Kahn, Kern, Moulton, JJ.


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