Opinion
December 12, 1988
Appeal from the County Court, Westchester County (Rosato, J.).
Ordered that the judgment is affirmed.
The defendant LaVerne Edwards and his codefendant Keith Watson were convicted of the robbery of a resident of a rooming house in the Village of Ossining, New York.
The defendant claims that inadequacies in the prosecutor's opening statement necessitate a new trial. Although the statement may have failed to sufficiently relate the facts to the various crimes charged in the indictment (see, People v Kurtz, 51 N.Y.2d 380, 384, cert denied 451 U.S. 911), the general rule is that absent bad faith or undue prejudice, a trial verdict will not be set aside for deficiencies in an opening statement (People v De Tore, 34 N.Y.2d 199, 207, cert denied sub nom. Wedra v New York, 419 U.S. 1025; People v Watson, 121 A.D.2d 487, lv denied 68 N.Y.2d 818). We find no bad faith in the instant case. Furthermore, we conclude, as in People v Watson (supra), that the trial court properly denied the defendant's motion for a mistrial because the curative instructions it delivered in response to the defendant's objection to the testimony regarding the suspect's names, overheard at the scene of the robbery, cured any prejudice which may have arisen (see, People v Watson, supra).
While we conclude that the hearing court improperly denied the defendant's application to preclude the prosecution from inquiring into a crime that had been dismissed on the People's own motion (see, People v Sanza, 37 A.D.2d 632), given the overwhelming evidence of guilt, the error was harmless (see, People v Scott, 118 A.D.2d 881, lv denied 67 N.Y.2d 1056). Mollen, P.J., Thompson, Rubin and Eiber, JJ., concur.