PEOPLE v. SANTANA (1998)

Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Joan Suldonik, J.), rendered June 5, 1995, convicting defendant, after a jury trial, of criminal possession of a controlled substance in the third degree and resisting arrest, and sentencing him, to concurrent prison terms of 11/313 to 4 years and 4 months, unanimously affirmed.

 Defendant's testimony concerning the alleged beating he suffered at the hands of the arresting officers was introduced for the purpose of establishing defendant's innocence by undermining the credibility of the officers testifying at trial and raising issues of existing bias that may have motivated them to allegedly frame him.   The People were entitled to contradict this non-collateral testimony with rebuttal evidence refuting defendant's (see, People v. Harris, 57 N.Y.2d 335, 344-346, 456 N.Y.S.2d 694, 442 N.E.2d 1205, cert. denied 460 U.S. 1047, 103 S.Ct. 1448, 75 L.Ed.2d 803;  People v. Payne, 235 A.D.2d 235, 652 N.Y.S.2d 273, lv. denied 89 N.Y.2d 1039, 659 N.Y.S.2d 870, 681 N.E.2d 1317).   The rebuttal evidence was sufficiently probative of defendant's medical condition at the time of the arrest, and its claimed deficiencies in this regard go to its weight and not its admissibility.   We have examined defendant's other arguments and find them to be without merit.

MEMORANDUM DECISION.