Professional Documents
Culture Documents
5 JOHN GrUCA/
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1 320 Jay Street
BrookJ-yn, New York
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February 20, 2078
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BEFORE HONORABLE DANNY K. CHUN
10 Justice of the Supreme Court
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T2 APPEARANCES
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ERIC GONZALEZ, ESQ.
I4 DTSTRICT ATTORNEY - KINGS COUNTY
for the People
15 350 Jay Street
Brooklyn, New York 1720I
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BY: JOSEPH ALEXIS, ESQ.
I7 LEONARD JOBLOVE, ESQ.
And MELISSA CARVAJAL, ESQ.
1B Assistant District Attorneys
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MARK BBDEROW/ ESQ.
20 Attorney for the Defendant
752 west 57th Street
2L New York, New York
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1 proceedings.
2 Al-1 right. Defendant is present and if he prefers
3 he may be seated. You can uncuff him.
4 Awhil-e back, I held a hearing on defendant's motion
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to set aside the judgment and I denied that motion with
6 my decision. And defendant appealed that decision and
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1 significant prison sentence that he faces either as a
2 result of the Peop1e's appeal to the Court of Appeals or
3 as a result of conviction and a retrial.
4 Now, we know that there is a chance that the Court
5 of Appeals may decl-ine to hear the case. Or, the Court
6 of Appeals may decide to hear the case and uphold the
7 Second Departmentfs ruling. So, in addition to pursuing
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an appeal to the Court of Appeals were presently
9 assessing the viability of a retrial-.
10 We ask to be given a reasonable amount of time to
11 evaluate where we stand with witnesses and evidence, and
L2 we ask to return in four months to update the court and
13 the defense as to the viabllity of a retrial.
T4 By that time, it's al-so possible that our
15 application for permission to appeal to the Court of
L6 Appeals will- have been decided. At that time, the court
I1 can reassess whether ball- shoul-d be appropriate in liqht
18 of both the status of our application for permission to
I9 appeal and our report to this court regarding the
20 viability of the case for retrial.
2I This is a matter that has been before several_
22 different courts that have issued several- different
23 rulings, which is why we find it prudent to be pursuing
24 our appeal to the Court of Appeals.
,q Thank you very much, your Honor.
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the Appel-late Division that that wasnrt the case. The
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1 the robbery was John Avitto. And I don't think that any
2 of us need to discuss any further the l-ikel-ihood that
3 John Avitto will ever testify in this courtroom ever
4 again.
5 So, the witness they're l-eft with is somebody named
6 Albert Cleary and thatts all- they have. And the problem
7 is Justice Marrus disnissed a murder case based on his
o testimony which only supported an intentional theory of
9 murder.
10 Albert Cleary, as the court may recall, alleged any
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22 a man who cal-l-ed 9LI but saw nothi-ng else and heard
23 nothing else. What she ignored were several other
24 witnesses who spoke to the police who lived in the house
25 where Mark was found and the next door neighbor.
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the car come right out of the driveway where Mark was
found.
Now, there is going to be evidence at a retrial-
that Cleary and DiPietro claim that they were at Albert.
Cleary's house when thi s murder happened which happens
to be right across the street from where Mark was shot.
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Not across from Gj-ucaf s house, across from Clearyts
house. And they cl-aim that they heard nothing because
the time they had l-eft Mr. Giucars house and arrived
home.
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2L on his own laid in ambush for Mark Fisher and shot him
22 by himself.
z3 The last point about switching to Cleary, there
24 just has to be a sense of fairness about this. In
25 Mr. Giuca's first trial-, they pulled Avitto like a
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alone that thatrs really what happened. There has to be
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a sense of fairness here and I think that shoul-d factor
into the courtrs decision.
The bottom line is a case that is going to be
centered on Al-bert C1eary and Angel DiPietro is a loser;
there is no question about that.
Finally, in the early stages of this investigation,
your Honor, from October of 2003, until the wlnter of
2004, this was a high profile investigation.
Mr. Giuca's name was in the newspaper al-I the time.
Everybody knew where he lived. He was even arrested in
October of 2003 before they had to let him go because
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they had no basis to arrest him then either.
The bottom lj-ne is what did he do? He got up, he
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11 That. was the most important reason why this case has
L2 taken over four thousand days.
13 He was found guilty of murder, after which he
I4 appealed his conviction. That appeal was denied which
15 is the second reason why it took so long.
L6 Now, I completely respect the Appellate Division's
I1 decision and Irm bound by it. But, I have to remark at
1B one thing, that both my decision which denied
I9 defendantrs application to set aside the judgment and
20 the Appell-ate Divisionrs order relies on the same exact
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10 continued.
11 Thank you.
L2 (Whereupon, the record was closed. )
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L4 REPORTERI S CERTIFICATION
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