NY: Recording Makes Crucial Difference in NY Defense Case

Last year, David Carlson of Sparrow Bush, New York, was a principal actor in a tragic situation involving a fugitive who was facing statutory rape charges.   Norris Acosta-Sanchez had fled the police and was living in a cabin not far from the Carlson’s home.  Carlson got to know him; well enough to invite him to dinner in his house several times.   Acosta-Sanchez eventually confided in Carlson that he was a wanted man, though he did not disclose the charges against him.

Carlson tried to cooperate with police to have Acosta-Sanchez taken into custody.   In a sequence of events worthy of the Keystone Cops, Acosta-Sanchez proved to be resourceful, and escaped at least twice.  Eventually he confronted Carlson; perhaps he felt betrayed. 

Carlson, a successful family man who was well liked in the community, used a shotgun to place Acosta-Sanchez under citizen’s arrest and marched him to a neighbor’s to have the neighbor call police.   On the way there, Acosta-Sanchez was shot and killed.   Carlson explained to the police that Acosta-Sanchez refused commands and lunged at him, and he was forced to shoot him in self defense.

Carlson was indicted with murder.   However, the indictment of the grand jury was based, in part, on a police investigator’s testimony.  The investigator claimed that Carlson had never said that Acosta-Sanchez had lunged at him. From recordonline.com:

At a pretrial hearing on statements Carlson made to police, Ostrer filed a strongly worded motion asking for the dismissal of the case. He argued that a police investigator testified to grand jurors that Carlson never claimed that Acosta-Sanchez lunged at him, when the recorded statements showed Carlson did.

Last month, Orange County Court Judge Robert Freehill dismissed the indictment. Freehill granted the prosecution the option of appealing the dismissal or presenting the case to a new grand jury. They opted for the new grand jury.

I do not know if the new grand jury will indict, or not.  But Carlson’s chances of avoiding a trial are much better now that the recorded evidence will be presented.

The saturation of society with small, cheap, reliable recording devices will change us in unknown ways.   It is already changing police behavior.  It is likely that nearly all police will wear body cameras 10 years from now.  I have strong suspicions that federal agents will be among the last to be required to do so.

The point here is that David Carlson would be in significantly worse difficulties if his remarks to the police had not been recorded.   Recording tends to work for the ordinary law abiding citizen in most cases.   I have read of numerous cases where armed citizens prevailed in legal battles with police because they took the precaution of recording the interaction.  We may become a society where everyone records themselves 24/7.   Some people are doing it already.  If you are going to have an interaction with authorities, it seems that recording it is a wise precaution.

©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
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