[*2]Appeal by the People from an order of the Criminal Court, Kings County (T. Farber, J.), dated June 4, 2002, which, after a hearing, granted defendant's motion to suppress identification evidence.

Order unanimously reversed on the law and facts, defendant's motion to suppress identification evidence denied and matter remanded to the court below for all further proceedings.

Shortly after 2:00 A.M. on July 27, 2001, the police discovered defendant concealed behind the opened door of an abandoned refrigerator in a trash-strewn space between a home and a detached garage, a short distance from the scene of an alleged illegal automobile dismantling operation from which several persons had fled only minutes before. Although the police broadcast only a general description of the fleeing suspects (which defendant matched), the intimate temporal and physical proximity of defendant's location to the crime scene coupled with his suspicious behavior, which "clearly signified that he was evading the police" (People v Reyes, 272 AD2d 244), justified his two-minute, unrestrained investigatory detention for an identification by another officer who allegedly witnessed defendant's participation in, and flight from, the dismantling activities (People v Duuvon, 77 NY2d 541, 544-545; see People v Jennings, 281 AD2d 285; Reyes, 272 AD2d 244; People v Rosa, 231 AD2d 534, 535; People v Johnson, 174 AD2d 694, 695). As the circumstances of the identification procedure were not unduly suggestive, suppression should have been denied.
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Decision Date: September 25, 2003