In People v. Archie (2d Dept. 3/2/2010), the Second Department unanimously vacated a conviction and sentence imposed by Supreme Court, Kings County. On appeal from his conviction of Robbery 1º, the defendant argued that the Supreme Court committed "reversible error in its instruction to the jury regarding" the lesser included offense of larceny.
Specifically, the defendant contended that the court's jury charge was defective in that it failed to articulate the mens rea requirement of intent. The court's instruction stated, "The offense of larceny is complete when there has been a taking or severance of the goods from possession, and even momentary possession of another's property is sufficient." In fact, larceny requires proof that the defendant had the "'intent to permanently deprive' the owner of his or her property" (quoting People v. Zambuto, 93 A.D.2d 873, 873 (2d Dept. 1983)). Therefore, the Second Department reasoned, the erroneous instruction "'could have misled the jury into thinking that any withholding . . . constituted larceny'" (quoting People v. Blacknall, 63 N.Y.2d 912, 914 (1984)(emphasis in original)). The court also noted that this error was compounded by a complete absence of a definition of "intent" in any of the jury instructions. The error was not harmless since intent was a close question. Therefore, the Second Department concluded that the error was not harmless, and the matter was remitted to Supreme Court for retrial. (JTR/LC)
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