People v. Byrne

The defendants appeal, pursuant to permission granted by Judge Fijld, from judgments of the Appellate Division, First Department, which affirmed judgments of Supreme Court, New York County (Klein, J.), convicting each of the defendants of attempted extortion.

The defendants, police officers, were convicted of attempting to obtain $500 from Ralph Cozzino by threatening to accuse him of a crime and cause him to be arrested and prosecuted. The victim had been convicted of a felony and a misdemeanor. He had been committed to institutions as a mental defective having a mental age of eight years.…