People v Richards

People v Richards 2007 NY Slip Op 02428 [38 AD3d 362] March 20, 2007 Appellate Division, First Department Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431. As corrected through Wednesday, May 9, 2007

The People of the State of New York, Respondent,
v
Mike Richards, Appellant.

—[*1] Richard M. Greenberg, Office of the Appellate Defender, New York (Risa Gerson of counsel), and Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, New York (Garrett A. Fail of counsel), for appellant.

Robert T. Johnson, District Attorney, Bronx (Peter D. Coddington of counsel), for respondent.

Judgment, Supreme Court, Bronx County (David Stadtmauer, J.), rendered February 25, 2005, convicting defendant, after a jury trial, of robbery in the first degree and sentencing him to a term of 10 years, unanimously affirmed.

The court properly excluded evidence of alleged third-party culpability, the probative value of which was minimal and was outweighed by its prejudicial effect (see People v Schulz, 4 NY3d 521, 528-529 [2005]; People v Mane, 36 AD3d 1079 [2007]). Inasmuch as defendant did not assert a constitutional right to introduce the excluded evidence, his constitutional argument is unpreserved (see People v Angelo, 88 NY2d 217, 222 [1996]; People v Morris, 21 AD3d 830, 831 [2005]), and we decline to review it in the interest of justice. Were we to review this claim, we would find no violation of defendant's right to present a defense (see Crane v Kentucky, 476 US 683, 689-690 [1986]).

We perceive no basis for reducing the sentence. Concur—Mazzarelli, J.P., Friedman, Buckley, Catterson and Malone, JJ.