By Michele Evans / NYweeklyRecord.com / Date: 10/28/2026
Category: Criminal Courts / Justice Reform / Due Process / Court Administration
NEW YORK CITY, NY – New York’s highest court has reversed a child-endangerment conviction and ordered a new trial after finding that jurors should have been allowed to consider self-defense.
The Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday in People v. Mears that the justification defense under Penal Law section 35.15 can apply when prosecutors base a child-endangerment charge on a defendant’s use of force. The decision rejects a categorical rule that had kept the defense out of some child-endangerment cases.
The case arose from a September 2022 confrontation between Stephen Mears and his girlfriend’s 15-year-old son. The teenager was left on the floor and appeared unconscious. Prosecutors charged Mears with endangering the welfare of a child and second-degree strangulation.
At trial, the teenager, his mother and Mears gave sharply different accounts. A forensic nurse testified about abrasions on the teenager’s neck, and a scientist testified that a swab from the neck likely contained Mears’s DNA. Prosecutors relied on the same alleged use of force to support both charges.
The trial judge gave jurors a self-defense instruction for the strangulation count but refused to give it for child endangerment. The jury acquitted Mears of strangulation and convicted him of child endangerment.
Writing for a unanimous court, Judge Caitlin Halligan said Article 35 makes justification available in any prosecution for an offense and contains no exception for child endangerment. When prosecutors choose a use-of-force theory and the record reasonably supports self-defense, jurors must receive the instruction.
The court did not decide that Mears acted lawfully, and it did not dismiss the case. It held only that a reasonable view of the evidence supported allowing the jury to weigh his claim that he reacted to punches from the teenager. That question will return to a trial jury if prosecutors retry the case.
The ruling also makes clear that conflicting testimony does not let a judge withhold the defense. Courts must view the evidence in the light most favorable to the accused when deciding whether to charge justification, even when other witnesses offer an opposing account.
The practical impact reaches beyond one prosecution. Trial judges will have to focus on how prosecutors actually present a child-endangerment case, not simply the name of the charge. If force is the theory, a legally supported self-defense claim cannot be screened out by a blanket rule.
For families and young people caught in violent household disputes, the decision does not weaken the state’s duty to protect children. It requires juries to receive the legal framework needed to decide both whether harmful conduct occurred and whether the claimed use of force was justified.
The unanswered question is what happens next. The conviction is gone, but the indictment remains. Prosecutors can proceed to a new trial, where the evidence and the competing accounts would be tested under the instruction the first jury never received.
Sources
People v. Mears, New York Court of Appeals, 2026 NY Slip Op 06237
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