BILL NUMBER: S6562                   Revised 1/18/18

SPONSOR: LANZA
 
TITLE OF BILL:  An act to amend the criminal procedure law, in
relation to suspending jury deliberations

This is one in a series of measures being introduced at the request of
the Chief Administrative Judge upon the recommendation of his Advisory
Committee on Criminal Law and Procedure.

This measure would amend the Criminal Procedure Law to allow a trial
court to suspend jury deliberations for up to three days (excluding
weekends and holidays) in appropriate cases.

In 1995, the Legislature gave trial courts discretion to forego seques-
tration in most cases (L. 1995, c. 83). Over the next several years, the
Legislature required the Chief Administrative Judge and the Office of
Court Administration to conduct an annual study of the change and file a
report with the Governor, the President of the Senate and the Speaker of
the Assembly. The reports found that there were significant cost-savings
to the change and that eliminating sequestration did not result in an
increase in jury tampering or an increase the number of mistrials. After
five years, the Legislature made permanent the changes and expanded the
              

reach of the statute to permit trial courts to forego sequestration in
all cases (L. 2001, c. 47)

A trial court's discretion is not unfettered, however, and the current
statute provides that a court may only suspend jury deliberations "for a
reasonable period of time . . . not to exceed twenty-four hours" (CPL
310.10(2)). Undoubtedly, the twenty-four hour limit is intended to
permit deliberating jurors to go home each night and return on the next
day when the court is in session. Unfortunately, circumstances often
arise that make it impossible to reconvene the jury within twenty-four
hours, as was illustrated in a recent case arising in Kings County (see
People v Taylor, 32 Misc 3d 546)

Sup Ct, Kings County 2011, Del Giudice,In Taylor, a deliberating juror
was briefly hospitalized and unable to return to court to resume further
deliberations the following day. The defense immediately moved for a
mistrial, claiming that the express language of CPL 310.10(2) prevented
the court from adjourning deliberations more than 24 hours, even though
the juror would be available one day later. There were no indications of
juror tampering nor did it appear that jury deliberations would be
impeded by the additional delay caused by the juror's hospitalization.
The case highlights the inflexibility of the statute, and the court
urged legislative action to amend the statute.

We believe that the arbitrary limit of twenty-four hours should be
relaxed in appropriate cases. While our Advisory Committee initially
considered recommending elimination of the twenty-four hour restriction
altogether and allowing courts discretion to suspend deliberations "for
a reasonable period of time," it ultimately favored an approach that
provides courts with more, but not unfettered, discretion. Thus, this
measure allows the court to suspend jury deliberations and separate the
jury until the close of business on the next day, or "for good cause
shown," until the close of business on the third day following the
recess. By requiring "good cause" for any suspension longer than one
business day, the measure insures that lengthy suspensions of jury
deliberations will not become routine.
This measure, which would have no meaningful fiscal impact on the State,
would take effect immediately, and shall apply to all criminal actions
pending on or after such effective date.

 
LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:

2017: S.6562 - Referred to Codes / A.7448 - Passed Assembly