PEOPLE v. AYALA (1999)

Judgment, Supreme Court, Bronx County (John Perone, J., at suppression hearing;  Dennis Boyle J., at plea and sentence), rendered March 27, 1997, convicting defendant of criminal possession of a weapon, and sentencing him, as a second felony offender, to a term of 21/212 to 5 years, unanimously affirmed.

 The police had reasonable suspicion justifying a frisk of defendant, or, at least, the officer's minimally intrusive act of grabbing the outside of defendant's pants pocket, which showed a bulge.   We reach this conclusion based upon the officers' rapid response to an anonymous call of shots fired from a described vehicle;  their observation, moments later, of defendant in a car that substantially matched the description of the vehicle in the radio run and that was at the precise location described therein;  the lack of any other cars in the vicinity that matched the radio run description or of other people in the area;  and the early morning hour (see, People v. Stewart, 41 N.Y.2d 65, 390 N.Y.S.2d 870, 359 N.E.2d 379;  People v. Reyes, 234 A.D.2d 63, 651 N.Y.S.2d 431, affd. 90 N.Y.2d 916, 664 N.Y.S.2d 256, 686 N.E.2d 1350).   Once the officer felt a hard object which he feared was a gun, it was proper for him to search the pocket (see, People v. Thomas, 176 A.D.2d 539, 540, 574 N.Y.S.2d 723, lv. denied 79 N.Y.2d 833, 580 N.Y.S.2d 213, 588 N.E.2d 111).  Accordingly, the suppression motion was properly denied.

MEMORANDUM DECISION.