People v Roldany

Criminal Court of the City of New York, Bronx County

Decided on April 6, 2026

Docket No. CR-008996-26BX

Philip V. Tisne, J.

On April 3, 2026, defendant was arraigned on a felony complaint charging him with Criminal Sale of a Controlled Substance in the Third Degree (Penal Law § 220.39(1)), two counts of Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance in the Third Degree (Penal Law § 220.16(1)), and two counts of Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance in the Seventh Degree (Penal Law § 220.03). At arraignment, the People requested a securing order imposing monetary conditions (or "bail"), arguing that defendant was bail-eligible under CPL 510.10(4)(t). The court rejected that argument and released defendant under non-monetary conditions. The court issues this written order to explain its decision.

A court is authorized to set bail only if the defendant is charged with a "qualifying offense." CPL 510.10(3)-(4). The CPL enumerates offenses that are qualifying offenses; that list excludes most misdemeanors and non-violent felonies, including all of the narcotics offenses charged in this case.

A "qualifying offense" also includes certain crimes committed while the defendant was on release for an earlier crime. This is the so-called "harm-on-harm" provision, and it defines a qualifying offense to include "any felony or class A misdemeanor involving harm to an identifiable person or property, or any charge of criminal possession of a firearm as defined in [ Penal Law § 265.01-b ], where such charge arose from conduct occurring while the defendant was released on his or her own recognizance, released under conditions, or had yet to be arraigned after the issuance of a desk appearance ticket for a separate felony or class A misdemeanor involving harm to an identifiable person or property, or any charge of criminal possession of a firearm as defined in [ Penal Law § 265.01-b ]." CPL 510.10(4)(t). For this provision to apply, the People must additionally establish reasonable cause to believe the defendant committed the instant and underlying offenses.

In this case, the People raised two arguments that the complaint charged qualifying offenses under CPL 510.10(4)(t). They argued that the charges in the complaint involved "harm to an identifiable person or property" because defendant's narcotics activities harmed the [*2]community. But as the People described their theory, the charged offenses involved harm only in the sense that they caused unspecified harm in an undifferentiated way indirectly to every member of the community. Such an approach does not identify harm to an identifiable person. And since every crime could be said to involve similarly vague harm to the entire community, adopting this approach would effectively and impermissibly eliminate the separate statutory requirement of harm to an identifiable person from CPL 510.50(4)(t). See People v. Giordano, 87 NY2d 441, 448 (1995); see also McKinney's Cons. Laws of NY, Book 1, Statutes § 98(a) ("A construction that would render a provision superfluous is to be avoided.").

The People also argued that the charged offenses were bail-eligible under CPL 510.10(4)(t), without the need to show any harm, because defendant was charged with a felony while on release for a separate felony.FN1 On this theory, the requirement to show "harm to an identifiable person or property" applies only if the instant or underlying offense is a misdemeanor, not if it is a felony.

The text of CPL 510.10(4)(t) refutes this position in at least two ways. First, the provision identifies applicable instant offenses (and predicate offenses) in two clauses, separated by a comma: the instant (or predicate) offense must be either a felony or misdemeanor, or a weapons charge under Penal Law § 265.01-b. The requirement to show "harm to an identifiable person or property" appears in the first clause pertaining to felonies and misdemeanors, and there is no punctuation within the clause to indicate that "harm to an identifiable person or property" was meant to modify only misdemeanors but not felonies. The People's apparent reliance on the last antecedent rule is thus inapt, since the clause they construe is more akin to an integrated list—to the extent it is a list at all. See Facebook, Inc. v. Duguid, 592 U.S. 395, 403 (2021) (citing Cyan v. Beaver Cty. Emps. Ret. Fund, 583 U.S. 416, 439-40 (2018)). Second, interpreting the first clause to apply to all felonies and any misdemeanor involving harm to identifiable persons or property would render the second clause superfluous, which makes weapons charges under Penal Law § 265.01-b separately eligible for bail-qualification under CPL 510.10(4)(t). Phrased differently, if the first clause means that all felonies are eligible for bail-qualification under CPL 510.10(4)(t) without any showing of harm to identifiable persons or property, there would be no need for the second clause to extend bail-qualification under CPL 510.10(4)(t) to any charge under Penal Law § 265.01-b, which is also a felony. See Giordano, 87 NY2d at 448.

People ex rel. Litman v Spano, 197 AD3d 1211, 1211 (2d Dep't 2021), does not appear to hold what the People claim, i.e., that CPL 510.10(4)(t) applies to any felony without the need to show harm to identifiable persons or property. Rather, the decision states that the defendant there was charged with a qualifying offense because he "was charged with felony offenses that 'arose from conduct occurring' while he was released on his own recognizance on a separate felony charge." Id. The decision does not expressly endorse the People's approach to CPL 510.10(4)(t), let alone explain why that counter-textual approach is necessary or appropriate. To the extent the decision addressed any statutory interpretation question, it appeared to address a dispute about whether one charge "arose from conduct occurring" after another one under CPL 510.10(4)(t), not a dispute about the phrase "harm to an identifiable person or property"—a phrase that appears nowhere in the decision.

Finally, to the extent other courts of coordinate jurisdiction have adopted the People's approach to CPL 510.10(4)(t), the court is not persuaded by their analysis for the reasons described above. See People v. Lee, 77 Misc 3d 794, 803 (N.Y.C. Crim. Ct. 2022); People v. Brown, 69 Misc 3d 229, 235 n.1 (County Ct., Orange County 2020).

Defendant in this case is not charged with any felony involving harm to identifiable persons or property. Accordingly, he is not charged with a qualifying offense under CPL 510.10(4)(t).

This constitutes the order of the court.

Dated: April 6, 2026

Bronx, New York

Hon. Philip V. Tisne