People v. Williams

We exercise our discretion to review here, notwithstanding defendant’s failure to preserve his claims by timely objection at trial, because the court’s response to the jury note requesting a clearer definition of "force” was so misleading and prejudicial as to deprive defendant of a fair trial (People v McCullough, 73 AD2d 310, 319; People v Branch, 54 AD2d 90, 93). While a trial court is permitted to use hypotheticals to aid the jury’s understanding of the matter before them, the hypothetical must be fair and must not reflect the court’s opinion as to how the issues should be resolved (see,…