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Published on: April 12, 2012

New York Appellate Court Rules on Manslaughter Case

by Stephen Bilkis

In 1978, a young woman moved in to a trailer home with her boyfriend off of North Shore Road in the little New York town of Cuba. They had a fairly normal life together according to her statements until July or August of 1981. In 1979, she had been unfaithful in her marriage and riddled with guilt had confessed her infidelity to her then husband. Her husband began to become abusive. While she struggled to try to keep him happy and be the best wife and mother that she could be to make up for her failure in the beginning of the marriage; her husband becomes more possessive. He questioned her repeatedly about men that she spoke to. He accused her of sleeping with men constantly. He began to be physically abusive. Following Christmas of 1982 , the violence escalated rapidly.

The young wife did not know how to drive and was by all accounts visibly battered. Her mother in law tried to get her to take the children and leave with her. By this time there were two children in the relationship. The wife stated that she was afraid to leave. She stated that if she left that he would find her and kill her. There were several serious incidents of battery and aggravated assaults. In one assault, the husband took a pencil and stabbed it into the wife’s foot. The pencil was removed at the local hospital, but there does not seem to be a police report to detail the incident surrounding the stabbing. The husband purportedly took her outside and beat her head against a tree on one occasion. Still, she did not call out for help or notify the local police.

Published on: April 11, 2012

New York Courts Decide Family Matter in Light of Domestic Violence Allegations

by Stephen Bilkis

On January 15, 1993 a man and a woman were married in a civil ceremony in Albania. Several years ago, they moved to Brooklyn, New York. In 2005, the parents and their five children went to visit their family in Albania. The wife is a stay at home mother who does not speak English. The husband is a businessman of questionable veracity. He has reported his income in three different places, three different ways. He has obviously grossly under estimated his income each time. When the husband left Albania to return to the US, he left his wife and children with his parents.

Two years later, his wife took the youngest child and went to her parent’s house. Before long, they discovered that because the children are American citizens that they would have to get divorced in Brooklyn. Eventually, the entire family made their way back to the US. The father and the oldest child live in the marital home, an apartment in Brooklyn. The mother and the four youngest children reside in a shelter.

Published on: April 10, 2012

Father Opposes Termination of Parental Rights in Light of Assault Allegations

by Stephen Bilkis

On September 28, 2010, the Family Court of Monroe County, New York heard a petition to grant two small children to be declared permanently neglected by their father. The father opposed the termination of his parental rights. The court addressed the issues.

In 2008, the children were removed from the home of their mother and father following an application for temporary removal of the children based on domestic violence incidents between the mother and the father of the two boys. The children were placed in foster care.

Published on: April 9, 2012

Defendant Raises Question Over Use of Breathalyzer Tests Admitted as Evidence in DUI Case

by Stephen Bilkis

In January of 2005, a man received two moving violations: one for speeding and one for a New York DWI. Because a New York DWI is a criminal violation, the man was not only ticketed but also arrested and faced criminal charges. There were two officers involved in the interaction with the man: an arresting officer and a law enforcement officer who administered a breathalyzer test to determine his blood alcohol content.

According to evidence presented at a subsequent trial before a judge, the arresting officer testified that the man was driving east on Route 404 in Webster, NY at around 2:03 in the morning on the night of the alleged New York DWI. The arresting officer noticed the man was driving too fast and his radar gun subsequently revealed that the man was driving 55 miles per hour in a 40 MPH zone.

Published on: April 8, 2012

New York Court Determines Outcome for Defendant Who Refused Breathalyzer Test

by Stephen Bilkis

Early one morning in March, 2004, two police officers directed a gentleman to pull over in his car due to an inoperable brake light, as well as what appeared to be excessive window tinting. Upon asking the gentleman to step out of his car, his unsteadiness was noted, as was the smell of alcohol; at which point, he was placed under arrest for driving while intoxicated. The Defendant was then taken to the police station to have a breathalyzer (an Intoxilyzer 5000, which was in good working order) administered, wherein he was videotaped, along with the two arresting officers and two additional officers out of camera view (one operated the camera).

Published on: April 6, 2012

New York Supreme Court Reduces Sex Offender Level for Defendant

by Stephen Bilkis

In a sex crime hearing in the Supreme Court, Kings County on August 3, 1998, the defendant’s sex offender level was lowered after the Court carefully considered all of the facts in the case. The defendant was convicted of one count of Attempted Rape in the First Degree, and a lesser crime of Count I of the indictment charging Rape in the First Degree, also known as statutory rape. Other charges in the indictment were based on the age of the victim. There were no allegations of forcible compulsion per se. The sex crime offender proposed that his moderate risk level should be reduced to a low risk level, and that the higher level was not consistent with facts that were part of his case and his due process rights.

In this sex crime, the defendant was arrested on March 5, 1993 and charged with Rape in the First Degree, Sex Abuse in the First Degree, and Endangering the Welfare of a Child. This resulted from the complaint of 10 year-old Jamila who stated that the defendant had removed her clothes, spread her legs, and placed his penis inside her vagina. Later that day, he gave her five dollars to not tell anyone what happened. The sex abuse charge was dismissed upon a technical error by the Grand Jury.

Published on: April 5, 2012

New York Appellate Court Determines if Expunging Record is Appropriate

by Stephen Bilkis

On June 9, 2005, the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, Third Department heard the case of Isaiah Brown, Appellant, v. Glenn S. G, as Commissioner of Correctional Services, Respondent. The appellant in this case wanted to have certain information expunged from documents provided to the petitioner under the Freedom of Information Law.

The petitioner was incarcerated at the time, resulting from his conviction of various sex crimes. These included the assault of a woman. The petitioner was also charged with rape and sodomy in the first degree in connection with this assault, but he was not convicted of these crimes. The petitioner later attempted to gain access to certain documents that were part of the rape and sodomy charges. His request was denied at first, but later the First Department reversed the decision on the basis that the proof submitted by the petitioner showed that the woman assaulted in this sex crime did not have an identity that needed to be protected,

Published on: April 4, 2012

New York Appellate Court Denies Sentence Reduction

by Stephen Bilkis

The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York heard the case of The People of the State of New York, Respondent v. Reginald S, Defendant-Appellant on August 25, 2011. The Supreme Court convicted him of two counts of rape in the first degree, criminal sexual act in the first degree (three counts), burglary in the second degree (three counts), robbery in the third degree (two counts) and attempted robbery in the third degree. He was convicted by a jury on May 24, 2007 and sentenced as a persistent violent felony offender to 150 years to life for these sex crimes.

On July 15, 2005, the defendant was charged with multiple counts of forcible rape, forcible criminal sexual act, burglary, robbery, and attempted robbery. These incidents supposedly took place over a two week time period on the upper west and east sides of Manhattan. They occurred around the same time on three separate dates. Three different women were attacked and robbed during these sex crimes. In all of these cases, the women had either had a cushion placed over their faces, and one woman was told to blindfold herself.

Published on: April 2, 2012

New York Supreme Court Hears Double Jeopardy Argument in DUI Case

by Stephen Bilkis

In separate incidents, two men were arrested for driving while intoxicated and other various violations of the Traffic Law. As a result of the filing of the charges for driving while intoxicated, the driver’s licenses of both these men were suspended automatically. After arraignment and during pre-trial, both men raised the same issue: they both contended that the prosecution of the charges for driving while intoxicated will be a violation of their constitutional right against double jeopardy as they had already been penalized for the same charges when their licenses were suspended. Both men filed motions for the dismissal of the criminal indictments against them.

The Supreme Court decided to hear and decide these two motions jointly and decided to deny the motions to dismiss.

Published on: April 1, 2012

Defendant Challenges Forensic Lab Results in DUI Case

by Stephen Bilkis

A woman was accused of driving while intoxicated. During her trial, the District Attorney presented affidavits and certifications attesting to the analysis and results of tests done by the forensic laboratory. The District Attorney tried to establish the reliability of the tests used by the forensic laboratory by further offering in evidence the certification of the Inspector General o the New York State Police Crime Laboratories attesting to the s of the tests as part of the regular course of business of the police crime laboratories.

The District Attorney also attempted to introduce into evidence the certifications of the officials of the Office of Public Safety as to the regularity of the inspection, maintenance and calibration performed by them on the machines used to test the alcohol content of the breath of accused.