PEOPLE v. BAILEY (2025)

Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Abraham L. Clott, J.), entered on or about September 1, 2022, which denied defendant's CPL 440.10 motion to vacate the judgment of conviction rendered December 23, 2015, unanimously affirmed.

The court providently exercised its discretion in summarily denying defendant's CPL 440.10 motion, as the motion could be determined based on the trial record and defendant's additional submissions (see People v. Satterfield, 66 N.Y.2d 796, 799, 497 N.Y.S.2d 903, 488 N.E.2d 834 [1985];  see also CPL 440.30[4][a]).

Although defendant's claims of ineffective assistance of counsel for failure to obtain defendant's psychiatric records were not procedurally barred by CPL 440.10(2)(c), which expressly does not apply to claims of ineffective assistance of counsel, the court nevertheless properly found, as an alternative holding, that defendant received effective assistance of counsel under the state and federal standards (see People v. Benevento, 91 N.Y.2d 708, 711–713, 674 N.Y.S.2d 629, 697 N.E.2d 584 [1998];  Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 689–692, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 [1984]).  Defendant has not shown that any of counsel's alleged deficiencies fell below an objective standard of reasonableness, or that they were prejudicial.  Although defendant faults counsel for failing to obtain his medical records, those records reflect that his psychiatric examiners concluded that defendant was likely not being truthful regarding his history of mental illness, that he appeared to be feigning experiencing hallucinations, and that he was probably malingering to manipulate the legal process.  Further, defendant told the Department of Probation that he was in “good mental health”;  he was not taking any psychiatric medication;  he was raised in a “stable home environment”;  and he was never the victim of abuse.  Under these circumstances, there is no reasonable probability that counsel would have prevailed had he conducted additional investigation and centered his defense at trial and mitigation theories at sentencing around those materials (see People v. Stultz, 2 N.Y.3d 277, 283, 778 N.Y.S.2d 431, 810 N.E.2d 883 [2004];  People v. Fernandez, 236 A.D.3d 527, 228 N.Y.S.3d 551 [1st Dept. 2025]).

Defendant's submissions did not establish a Brady violation by the People in failing to disclose NYPD paperwork pertaining to the hospitalization and medical examination of defendant after the incident.  Initially, his contention that the form exists is speculative.  Second, any information it contained could not be considered “suppressed,” because defendant “knew of, or should reasonably have known of, the evidence and its exculpatory nature”;  he would know of his own hospitalization and exams (People v. Doshi, 93 N.Y.2d 499, 506, 693 N.Y.S.2d 87, 715 N.E.2d 113 [1999]).  Furthermore, defendant did not demonstrate “a reasonable probability that the result would have been different if the evidence had been disclosed,” as the information he suggests that NYPD form would have conveyed was adduced at trial through witness testimony (People v. Giuca, 33 N.Y.3d 462, 473–474, 104 N.Y.S.3d 577, 128 N.E.3d 655 [2019]).