PEOPLE v. MELBOURNE (2023)

Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Felicia Mennin, J.), rendered February 8, 2022, convicting defendant, upon his plea of guilty, of assault in the second degree, and sentencing him to a term of five years' probation, unanimously modified, as a matter of discretion in the interest of justice, to the extent of reducing the sentence to four years of probation, and otherwise affirmed.

The court providently exercised its discretion by enhancing defendant's sentence based on two new arrests that violated the no-arrest condition of the plea.  One arrest involved a legitimate self-defense claim and the other involved the theft of a cookie that cost a dollar.  The charges underlying both postplea arrests were dismissed and the People do not oppose defendant's request for a reduction of his sentence to four years of probation.  As a result, we conclude that the sentence should be reduced in the interest of justice to the extent indicated, thus comporting with the originally promised sentence at the plea proceeding (see People v. Primack, 276 A.D.2d 268, 716 N.Y.S.2d 282 [1st Dept. 2000]).