Defendants Rashid Mack and Daquan Graves each move pursuant to CPL § 210.20(1)(b) to dismiss the above-captioned indictment on the ground that the evidence presented to the grand jury was legally insufficient to establish their criminal liability under an accessorial theory. Following oral argument and supplemental briefing, the Court, with such arguments in mind, reexamined all grand jury evidence. For the reasons that follow, the motions are DENIED.

Defendants Mack and Graves are jointly charged by indictment with the following offenses:

1. Attempted Murder in the Second Degree (Penal Law §§ 110.00, 125.25[1]);

2. Attempted Assault in the First Degree (Penal Law §§ 110.00, 120.10[1]);

3. Criminal Possession of a Weapon in the Second Degree (Penal Law § 265.03[1][b]).

All charges are based on a theory of accomplice liability under Penal Law § 20.00. The principal actor, Defendant Jerimiah Greenidge is alleged to have opened fire in a residential complex during daylight hours. The People allege that Mack and Graves intentionally aided and facilitated the commission of the offenses.

Pursuant to CPL § 210.20(1)(b), a defendant may move to dismiss an indictment on the ground that the evidence before the grand jury was not legally sufficient to support the charges. The Court's review at this stage is confined to the legal sufficiency of the evidence. Appellate courts have repeatedly described the standards by which a reviewing court is to assess such a motion: the sufficiency of the People's presentation "'is properly determined by inquiring whether the evidence viewed in the light most favorable to the People, if unexplained and uncontradicted, would warrant conviction by a petit jury.'" People v. Jensen, 86 NY2d 248, [*2]251—252 (1995), quoting, People v. Jennings, 69 NY2d 103, 114 (1986). CPL § 70.10(1).

The inquiry of the reviewing court is limited to ascertaining the legal sufficiency of the evidence and does not include weighing the proof or examining its adequacy at the Grand Jury stage, or determining whether there was reasonable cause to believe the accused committed the crimes charged, as the resolution of such questions is exclusively the province of the Grand Jury. Jensen at 251-252.

With those principles in mind, the Court's inquiry here is limited to "'whether the facts, if proven, and the inferences that logically flow from those facts supply proof of every element of the charged crimes,' and whether 'the Grand Jury could rationally have drawn the guilty inference.' That other, innocent inferences could possibly be drawn from those facts is irrelevant to the sufficiency inquiry 'as long as the Grand Jury could rationally have drawn the guilty inference.'" People v. Bello, 92 NY2d 523, 526 (1998), quoting, People v. Deegan, 69 NY2d 976, 979 (1987).

On June 28, 2024, the sequence of events began when Defendant Daquan Graves drove a red Subaru with Connecticut license plates from Adams Street into the Quik Shoppe parking lot at approximately 1:17 PM. Surveillance footage captured Defendants Jeremiah Greenidge and Rashid Mack exiting the vehicle wearing full sweatsuits with their hoods over their heads and masks partially drawn over their faces. Graves backed the Subaru into a fuel bay, facing the storefront.

Surveillance footage and GPS tracking provided direct, time-stamped evidence of the defendants' coordinated movements before, during, and after the shooting. Greenidge walked to the store's window, pulled up his mask, looked inside, and turned away, lowering the mask. Mack remained in the parking lot, alternately raising and lowering his own mask. Neither entered the store. They then returned to the Subaru and conversed with Graves, during which Mack continued fidgeting with his mask. A fourth individual, Ramello Jackson, also exited the Subaru.

At 1:20 PM, the Subaru departed the Quik Shoppe with Graves driving and all three defendants and Jackson inside. Jackson would later be seen on Adams Street speaking with police about a separate shooting at approximately 2:00 PM.

At 1:49 PM, the Subaru was captured on surveillance entering the West Village apartment complex. The Subaru first traveled down the dead-end section of West Village Place Road, exited, then re-entered the area via Ackerman Circle, a circular lot with no alternate exits. Graves slowly rounded the circle without stopping or letting out passengers and then departed to Elm Street. About ten seconds after the Subaru left, a person in a white shirt emerged into the parking lot, gesturing with his arms in the direction the vehicle had just driven away.

Approximately ninety seconds later, at 1:55 PM, Defendant Greenidge—still wearing the same gray sweatsuit and with his hood up and mask on—approached the Ackerman Circle area on foot from the direction the Subaru had taken on Elm Street. Greenidge stopped briefly to converse with Defendant Mack, who was partially concealed in a shaded and wooded area near the roadway entering Ackerman Circle. Ten seconds later, Greenidge walked up Ackerman Circle as Mack appeared partially in the shadows of the entrance. At 1:56 PM Greenidge then drew a concealed handgun from his waistband and opened fire multiple times in the direction of the apartment complex in the direction of the male in the white T-Shirt and another individual, [*3]whereupon the male in the T-Shirt returned fire.

GPS data from Mack's electronic monitoring ankle bracelet confirmed that he traveled with Graves and Greenidge from the Quik Shoppe to West Village and was positioned near the scene at the time of the shooting. Mack did not flee during the gunfire but remained nearby and fled jointly with Greenidge moments after Greenidge opened fire. Police recovered more than a dozen spent shell casings near a tree and also documented bullet strikes to a red vehicle and a residential building. Immediately following the shooting, Greenidge and Mack fled together from the scene in the same direction the Subaru had departed. About an hour after the shooting, video surveillance footage from the Arthaus Apartments confirmed that Graves had picked up Greenidge and Mack after their flight as all three were observed exiting the red Subaru.

It is well established that circumstantial evidence, if credible and logically connected, may suffice to support accessorial liability. See, People v. Bleakley, 69 NY2d 490 (1987). Penal Law § 20.00 imposes criminal liability where a person, acting with the requisite mental culpability, "solicits, requests, commands, importunes, or intentionally aids" another in committing an offense. The statute requires both actus reus (affirmative conduct) and mens rea (specific intent).

Defendants place great reliance upon People v. Goodman, 231 AD3d 1366 (3rd Dept. 2024), and People v. Walker, 227 AD3d 1129 (3rd Dept. 2024), which reversed convictions where defendants were merely present or affiliated with the principal actor. Additionally, both of those cases involved appellate review after jury convictions and presumably both indictments survived legal sufficiency analysis at the grand jury motion to dismiss procedural stage. Unlike the rational inferences that can be drawn in this case, the Goodman case did not involve a planned and coordinated attack. The Goodman codefendants did not reconnoiter the house, did not immediately commit a crime upon entering the house, did not conceal their identity and there was no evidence that they fled the area together. In Walker, the Third Department reversed an assault conviction after trial and dismissed the indictment finding that the trial evidence was legally insufficient under an accomplice theory because there was insufficient evidence that "defendant shared a community of purpose" with the shooter, there was "no evidence that defendant formed a plan with anyone to assault the victim or had any advance knowledge that the victim was going to be attacked," and the altercation was not planned but was "brief and seemingly chaotic." People v. Walker, 227 AD3d 1132 (3rd Dept. 2024). The Walker Court continued that, "[t]his situation is also not akin to cases where an accomplice's community of purpose with a fellow assailant can be inferred from his [ ] continued participation in an attack after the other produces a weapon." Id.

Here, the evidence includes:

• Coordinated transportation to and from the crime scene;

• Tactical circling of the complex prior to the shooting (i.e., reconnoitering);

• GPS-confirmed positioning near the crime scene during the shooting;

• Circumstantial evidence that the shooting was planned and not the result of chaotic spontaneity;

• Use of masks by two of the codefendants;

• Use of a lookout;

• Use of a getaway driver; and

• Shared flight and regrouping immediately after the crime.

In People v. Thomas, 113 AD3d 447 (1st Dept. 2014), affirming a conviction predicated upon accomplice liability, the First Department noted that "Defendant's accomplice liability could reasonably be inferred from the chain of events*** Defendant's conduct and that of the other participant in the crime 'made little sense unless defendant was a participant and not a spectator'" People v. Thomas, 113 AD3d 447 (1st Dept. 2014), quoting, People v Marte, 7 AD3d 405, 406 (1st Dept. 2004) (emphasis added). A defendant may be held liable as an accomplice if the evidence supports the rational inference that he "shared a community of purpose" with the principal. People v. Allah, 71 NY2d 830, 832 (1988). See, People v. Scott, 25 NY3d 1107, 1110 (2015) (to be liable under an acting in concert theory, the accomplice and principal must share a "community of purpose").

Here, the grand jury could have rationally inferred from the totality of the circumstances that Defendants Greenidge, Mack, and Graves "shared a community of purpose" and were working as a team when Greenidge fired shots at the West Village Apartments. Specifically, the grand jury could rationally infer that the codefendants' actions were planned, i.e., that Graves drove Mack and Greenidge to West Village Apartments, the three of them reconnoitered the apartment building for the intended victim, and that Mack and Greenidge returned on foot to the West Village Apartments in order to commit the crime, with Greenidge acting as principal shooter, Mack acting as the lookout, and Graves acting as the getaway driver. See, People v. Knox, 137 AD3d 1330 (3rd Dept. 2016) (accomplice liability may be premised solely on defendant acting as a getaway driver). See also, People v. Hill, 225 AD2d 1076 (4th Dept. 1996) (evidence was legally sufficient to support defendant's second-degree murder conviction as accomplice arising out of his participation in shooting of man in parking lot, where he served as lookout and driver of getaway car). See also, People v. Jackson, 117 AD2d 822, 823 (2nd Dept. 1986) ("under the totality of the circumstances, there was sufficient evidence that the defendant was acting as a lookout, and was not just coincidentally present at the scene," and consequently the trial court erred in dismissing the indictment) (emphasis added). See also, People v. Bracey, 41 NY2d 296, 302 (1977) (jury could well find that the defendants, who acted together throughout, had reconnoitered the store and returned to rob it) (emphasis added).

Mack's and Graves' conduct "made little sense" unless they were participants and "shared a community of purpose" with Greenidge. The grand jury could rationally infer from the totality of circumstances that Mack and Graves were accomplices and not merely spectators. The fact that other rational inferences consistent with innocence could be drawn, at this procedural stage, are irrelevant, as such arguments are for a petit jury to consider. People v. Deegan, 69 NY2d 976, 979 (1987).

This Court finds that the evidence presented to the grand jury, if accepted as true and viewed in the light most favorable to the People, supports a rational inference that both Graves and Mack acted with a shared community of purpose alongside the principal, Greenidge. The coordinated travel, spatial positioning, joint flight from the shooting scene and immediate regrouping rationally support the theory of accessorial liability.

Accordingly, the motions of Defendant Mack and Defendant Graves to dismiss the indictment for legal insufficiency are DENIED.

Defendant Greenidge, Defendant Mack, and Defendant Graves are hereby ORDERED to [*4]appear before the Court on September 2, 2025, at 10:00 AM for Lafler hearings and in order to schedule jury trial dates.

This constitutes the Decision of the Court entered upon notice to all parties. A notice of appeal, if applicable, must be filed within thirty (30) days of the date of this decision.