| People v Torres |
| 2019 NY Slip Op 08229 [177 AD3d 785] |
| November 13, 2019 |
| Appellate Division, Second Department |
[*1]
| The People of the State of New York,Respondent, v Rafael Torres, Appellant. |
Philip H. Schnabel, Chester, NY, for appellant.
David M. Hoovler, District Attorney, Goshen, NY (Robert H. Middlemiss ofcounsel), for respondent.
Appeal by the defendant from an amended judgment of the County Court, OrangeCounty (Craig Stephen Brown, J.), rendered May 9, 2018, revoking a sentence ofprobation previously imposed by the Supreme Court, New York County (BonnieWittner, J.), upon a finding that he violated a condition thereof, after a hearing, andimposing a sentence of imprisonment upon his previous conviction of assault in thesecond degree.
Ordered that the amended judgment is affirmed.
On October 20, 2016, the defendant pleaded guilty to assault in the second degree inexchange for a promised sentence of a period of probation. In December 2017, thedefendant, who had moved to Orange County, was charged, inter alia, with violating acondition of his probation after he was arrested and charged with assault in the thirddegree and criminal mischief in the fourth degree. After a hearing, the County Courtdetermined that the defendant violated a condition of his probation. Subsequently, thecourt revoked the sentence of probation and imposed a term of six years' imprisonmentplus a period of three years' postrelease supervision on the previous conviction of assaultin the second degree.
The defendant's contention that the County Court improvidently exercised itsdiscretion in denying, without further inquiry, his repeated motions for new assignedcounsel, made on the date of the scheduled violation hearing and prior to the impositionof the amended sentence, is without merit. "The right of an indigent criminal defendantto the services of a court-appointed lawyer does not encompass a right to appointment ofsuccessive lawyers at defendant's option" (People v Sides, 75 NY2d 822, 824[1990]; see People vDegracia, 173 AD3d 1199 [2019]; People v King, 161 AD3d 772, 774 [2018]). A trial court'sduty to consider substitution arises "only where [the] defendant makes a 'seeminglyserious request[ ]' " (People v Porto, 16 NY3d 93, 100 [2010], quotingPeople v Sides, 75 NY2d at 824). Here, the record does not provide a basis toconclude that the defendant's motions were based on specific factual allegations of aserious complaint about his counsel (see People v Stevens, 162 AD3d 1077, 1078 [2018];People v King, 161 AD3d at 774; People v McErlean, 149 AD3d 872, 873 [2017]).
The amended sentence imposed was not excessive (see People v Suitte, 90AD2d 80 [1982]). Dillon, J.P., Maltese, Duffy and Barros, JJ., concur.