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People v. Cannizzaro

1 N.Y.2d 167 Court N.Y. Decision date 1956-04-27 English

Delivered by *169 Desmond, J.

Contents

Majority

p. 167
The People of the State of New York, Respondent, v. John Cannizzaro, Appellant.
Argued November 23, 1955;
decided April 27, 1956.
p. 168
John I. O'Day and Nathan D. Seeberg for appellant.
I. The alleged statement of the father of defendant should not have been received in evidence. (People v. Ferraro, 293 N. Y. 51 ; People v. Robinson, 273 N. Y. 438 ; Jenkins v. 313-321 West 37th St. Corp., 284 N. Y. 397 .) II. The trial court abused its discretion in failing to require the witnesses Aurigemma and Napolitano to state, upon cross-examination, their home addresses. III. Certain statements made by the District Attorney in his summation were prejudicial.
Ralph S. Cramer, District Attorney, for respondent.
I. The evidence established the guilt of defendant. II. It was proper for the court to refuse to order the witness Aurigemma to reveal his family residence. III. The admission of the prior inconsistent statement of the witness Cannizzaro for the sole purpose of impeaching his credibility was proper. (People v. Ferraro, 293 N. Y. 51 ; People v. Rudolph, 303 N. Y. 73 .) IV. The summation of the District Attorney was proper,

The trial court stretched section 8-a of the Code of Criminal Procedure much too far when it submitted to the jury the whole content of the extrajudicial statement of defendant’s father including its obviously hearsay, conclusory and prejudicial reference to ‘ ‘ the night that he [defendant] burned the hotel But it would be going too far in the opposite direction to hold that section 8-a did not authorize the showing to the jury of any part of that prior statement.

The trial testimony of Cannizzaro, Sr., contained at least three statements relevant to the issues: his denial that he was at the hotel before the fire, his denial that he had ever seen the torches found at the hotel after the fire, and his denial that there had been any straw at the hotel. That relevant and pertinent (although negative) testimony permitted the People, under section 8-a {supra), to impeach the witness by showing that he had made a prior statement inconsistent with those denials (People v. Marino, 288 N. Y. 411 , 417). Therefore, the trial court should have admitted into evidence for impeachment purposes so much only of the statement of Cannizzaro, Sr., as controverted the three denials above listed. Putting it more specifically, it was error to let the jury see so much of the pretrial statement as contained this language: “ that my son had straw, but I did not know at any time where it came from it was likewise error to let the jury see the sentence of the statement beginning: “We were the only two ”, the sentence beginning: 11 The night he burned the hotel ’ ’, and the sentence beginning: “I also declare ’’.

The judgments should be reversed and a new trial ordered.

Conway, Ch. J., Dye, Fuld, Froessel, Van Voorhis and Burke, JJ., concur.

Judgments reversed, etc.

Cases cited