NYC pays $17M in three Queens wrongful conviction cases amid fears about prosecutor misconduct — ‘Some people get framed’
Source: https://www.nydailynews.com
The ghost of Queens District Attorney Richard Brown has cost city taxpayers $17.25 million in the past five months.
The money is being paid to settle three lawsuits alleging prosecutorial misconduct during Brown’s tenure leading the office from 1991 to his death in 2019 — and comes amid growing scrutiny of some New York prosecutors’ pursuit of criminal convictions at all costs.
Brown seems to have been aware of his office’s alleged misconduct, which imprisoned people for years for crimes they were later found not to have committed.
At one point, Brown wrote to a top aide, Jack Ryan: “Jack, I think we’ve been getting away with this sort of thing for a long time.”
That quote comes from a document uncovered by Joel Rudin, a lawyer who represents the three men who won the $17.25 million in legal settlements.
[More New York] A 16-year ordeal for man who won $6.25M settlement from city over Queens wrongful conviction »
“The issue has been percolating for many years and is suddenly capturing public attention more than it ever has before,” said Bennett Gershman, a Pace University law professor who has studied prosecutorial misconduct for nearly 40 years.
Gershman says the issue has hit a tipping point at the same time police behavior has come under scrutiny after the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and other people killed by cops.
The latest previously undisclosed settlement involving the Queens DA’s office was for Kareem Bellamy, who in July reached an $8 million settlement in a lawsuit that claimed he was wrongly arrested for a 1994 murder and sent to prison for 14 years.
[More New York] A 16-year ordeal for man who won $6.25M settlement from city over Queens wrongful conviction »
Bellamy’s suit alleged that Queens prosecutors withheld key evidence in the case that might have led a jury to exonerate him.
Bellamy settled a separate case with the state in 2015 for $2.75 million.
Former Queens District Attorney Richard Brown in 2017. (Barry Williams/New York Daily News)
In September, the city settled with Rhiann Taylor for $3 million, ending a lawsuit that also alleged Queens prosecutors withheld key evidence. Taylor served nine years in prison.
[More New York] Mayor-elect Adams wants to give Frank Serpico long deserved Medal of Honor certificate »
And late in November, school custodian Julio Negron settled for $6.25 million after he was convicted of a 2005 shooting and spent 10 years behind bars. He alleged Queens prosecutors withheld evidence that would have pointed to another suspect.
Increased scrutiny of city district attorneys’ offices has come from a group of law professors, who are trying to use the state’s courts grievance committees to highlight prosecutorial misconduct cases. The professors are fighting an uphill battle.
The group has filed complaints against 21 current and former Queens prosecutors. The city Law Department countered with a complaint to the grievance committees that says by going public with their complaints about prosecutors, the professors are “misus[ing] and indeed abus[ing] the grievance process to promote a political agenda” in a way that “should not be countenanced.”
[More New York] Man killed in bloody shooting inside Queens apartment »
And the grievance committees themselves converted the professors’ complaints into a private matter — which would prevent the public from knowing the results of their investigations, the professors complain in a federal lawsuit.
A 2018 state law established a commission with subpoena power to investigate and recommend discipline in prosecutorial misconduct cases. District attorneys have fought the measure at every step. After a judge ruled the commission was unconstitutional, legislators passed another law. That commission has not yet been set up.
It’s not clear how widespread the problems are in New York. Gershman said he knows of no database of prosecutorial misconduct cases.
[More New York] Rikers inmate breaks NYC correction officer’s nose with headbutt after refusing order to spit out blade »
Instead, he says, the belief that prosecutors improperly withhold evidence and engage in unfair tactics to win convictions is largely anecdotal.
“We are relying on cases where we can identify prosecutors and learn whether they were held accountable,” Gershman said. “This is the consensus among people who know about the system.”
Brown’s 28-year tenure as Queens DA has been a focus of criticism as his prosecutors have had a high number of convictions reversed, said Rudin, who has litigated prosecutorial misconduct cases for 25 years.
[More New York] Woman bystander shot in ear after gunman opens fire on Bronx street »
The Queens office was “an insulated community that operated without a lot of public scrutiny or accountability,” Rudin said.
“You had a very conservative, very powerful, mostly white prosecutor’s office with very little turnover,” he said. “The whole office, from the top down, developed the attitude that the ends justified the means. They thought they were trying to put bad people away and winning was much more important than fair play.”
Senior members of Brown’s staff admitted in depositions obtained by Rudin that there was little to no formal discipline after cases were overturned on misconduct grounds. Just one attorney has been forced out of the DA’s office for such violations since Brown took office in 1991.
[More New York] Shoplifter pulls gun on Bronx grocery store employee in caught-on-camera clash »
In a 2019 deposition, Ryan — Brown’s longtime and most senior aide — acknowledged no one had been suspended, demoted, lost vacation days or denied a promotion for failing to turn over exculpatory evidence to the defense or making improper statements during trial.
He also said he couldn’t recall a time an assistant district attorney got a negative evaluation for failing to turn over such evidence.
Julio Negron, left, and his lawyer Joel Rudin with a copy of a police report in his case. (Barry Williams/for New York Daily News)
After 2012, Brown created a Committee on Professional Standards, but in depositions taken in 2019, four veteran prosecutors said they had never even heard of the committee or received written disciplinary policies, with one saying, “That’s first time (I’m) hearing of it.”
[More New York] Man slashed with blade in unprovoked attack by deranged woman on Queens-bound train »
Brown’s committee never published its reviews or findings.
Rudin contends that the message from the top was that there were no consequences.
“I asked them if they ever tried to find out if ADAs [assistant district attorneys] understood at the time of their behavior if they were violating the rules, and they admitted they never asked them what their knowledge of the rules was when they acted,” Rudin said.
[More New York] Young teen beaten up, robbed in brutal caught-on-camera attack »
State appellate judges knew what went on in Brown’s office.
During oral argument in an appeal of a murder case in 2018, Judge Leonard Austin laid into the office for making exaggerations and improperly trying to play on the jury’s sympathy during opening and closing statements.
“I feel like a broken record because I address this every time or almost every time the Queens DA is before us,” Austin said. “I’m here nine years this week. It’s nine years of the same thing. At some point your office’s improprieties are going to get a guilty person walking.”
[More New York] Cops hunt for creep who tried to lure 9-year-old girl into van »
When the lawyer representing the DA’s office argued the summation was proper, a second judge, Sylvia Hines-Radix cut her off. “Here there is behavior that is pervasive and it’s disturbing to this bench,” she said.
The suspect in that case, Luis Cherry, was granted a new trial.
In an August 2018 hearing over an appeal of Jose Velez’s burglary conviction, the appellate panel once again made a broad criticism of the office over improper closing statements.
[More New York] Accused shoplifter drops cop who confronted him at Manhattan drug store »
“I could read this summation, and without knowing what office it’s from, would say it’s from Queens,” said Judge Robert Miller, according to a video of the hearing. “That’s the reputation that your office is building with this court, because this happens repeatedly.”
Robert Masters, a former top aide to Brown, says it’s wrong to assign sinister motives to the Queens DA’s office. “From our perspective, the notion that all of these matters are interconnected and it all starts from an original sin committed by Judge [Richard] Brown is not sustainable,” Masters said.
“At the end of the day, two things can be true at once. It can be that a mistake can happen and the defendant can receive some relief, but that doesn’t mean that mistake was the result of someone trying to cheat. ... I think we did as much training in this area as any office in the state.”
Rhiann Taylor settled a case with the city for $3 million in her lawsuit charging Queens prosecutors with withholding key evidence in her case. Taylor served nine years in prison. (Barry Williams/for New York Daily News)
Bellamy was 28 when he was convicted of the fatal 1994 stabbing of James Abbott in Far Rockaway. His conviction was overturned in 2007 and then dismissed in 2011.
His lawyers sued, alleging that detectives coerced witnesses. They also alleged payments to a key witness were not disclosed, and that the prosecutor made improper claims in his closing statements, including: “The evidence shows that you are a murderer and that you are not going to get away with it, not this time.” Under the state Rules of Professional Conduct, it’s improper for a lawyer to “assert a personal opinion as to the guilt or innocence of an accused.”
“I was able to get compensated out of a tragic injustice,” Bellamy told the Daily News. “This sends a message to prosecutors and to judges that some people get framed and some people, they don’t take the job they have seriously. The system needs to change and people need to be held accountable.”
[More New York] Mom of Rikers detainee laments dangerous conditions, lack of mental health services in the jails »
Brad Leventhal, one of the prosecutors who handled the hearing in the Bellamy case that led to the conviction being overturned, once insisted that Bellamy “has not – I repeat, he has not – been exonerated.”
Leventhal resigned in March after a judge ruled he and other prosecutors committed “egregious misconduct” in withholding key evidence in the unrelated case of three men exonerated after serving 24 years in prison in the 1996 slayings of an off-duty police officer and a check cashing store owner.
Metro: Kareem Bellamy, who spend 17 years in jail for the stabbing death of James Abbott, smiles as his murder conviction was overturned. Photo was taken at Queens Criminal Court located at 125-01 Queens Boulevard in Kew Gardens, New York on Friday, September 16, 2011. (DelMundo, Anthony freelance NYDN/Anthony DelMundo)
Taylor, now 35, was convicted for the 2007 slaying of Darion Brown in Laurelton. The state Court of Appeals overturned his conviction in 2015 and he was acquitted at retrial.
[More New York] Inmate dies at Rikers Island, becoming 15th death in NYC custody this year »
Taylor’s lawsuit alleged that a prosecutor failed to turn over evidence that two key witnesses had received benefits from the DA’s office that influenced their testimony. One of those witnesses told a judge in an unrelated hearing that he didn’t see the crime and that both he and the other key witness were intoxicated - then testified at trial that they were sober.
Former Queens District Attorney Richard Brown. (Mary Altaffer/AP)
Negron’s suit contended that an NYPD detective and the Queens prosecutor pressured the shooting victim into identifying Negron as the triggerman, and information about a possible second suspect was withheld from the defense.
Two courts concluded that the prosecutor misled the trial judge, leading to the case being overturned and then dismissed.
[More New York] NYC correction officer busted for pulling gun on Irving Plaza security guard »
One key piece of evidence in his case was a form shown to the victim during a lineup that identified Negron by name as the “suspect” and listed where in the lineup he would appear.
The form helped law enforcement convict Negron, said Rudin. “They took an uncertain witness, and led him to become a certain witness,” he explained.
The Queens District Attorney seal (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
A fundamental problem is that prosecutors’ zeal to get convictions often leads to misconduct, said Ellen Yaroshefsky, a Hofstra University law professor who studies the issue and worked as an expert in the Bellamy case.
“The courts have looked at this and found significant instances and patterns of misconduct, and DA’s offices should be proactive in creating projects and programs to overcome misconduct,” she said.
Yaroshefsky is surprised Bellamy, Taylor and Negron got their cases heard. “It’s remarkable that these plaintiffs were even able to get into court, much less succeed in a settlement, because most applications are denied and not treated seriously,” she said.
Queens DA Melinda Katz talks to reporters after voting in the Queens borough of New York, Tuesday, June 25, 2019. (Seth Wenig/AP)
Some district attorneys are reacting to the new scrutiny. Incoming Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg acknowledges a need for more oversight of prosecutors’ actions.
Bragg has said promotions will no longer be tied to prosecutors’ conviction rates, and he will have a “zero tolerance” policy when prosecutors fail to turn over evidence favorable to the defense.
[More New York] Hateful vandals draw swastika into wet cement outside Brooklyn home: video »
“The office will not treat willful hiding of evidence as something requiring ‘more training,’” Bragg wrote in his Day 1 Memo. “Those who engage in such conduct will be terminated.”
A spokesman for current Queens DA Melinda Katz insists she has revamped and broadened training, using the work of the office’s Conviction Integrity Unit. “(That unit) has brought into sharp focus the high ethical and procedural standards that are required to ensure the integrity of prosecutions,” the spokesman said.
The ghost of Queens District Attorney Richard Brown has cost city taxpayers $17.25 million in the past five months.
The money is being paid to settle three lawsuits alleging prosecutorial misconduct during Brown’s tenure leading the office from 1991 to his death in 2019 — and comes amid growing scrutiny of some New York prosecutors’ pursuit of criminal convictions at all costs.
Brown seems to have been aware of his office’s alleged misconduct, which imprisoned people for years for crimes they were later found not to have committed.
At one point, Brown wrote to a top aide, Jack Ryan: “Jack, I think we’ve been getting away with this sort of thing for a long time.”
That quote comes from a document uncovered by Joel Rudin, a lawyer who represents the three men who won the $17.25 million in legal settlements.
[More New York] A 16-year ordeal for man who won $6.25M settlement from city over Queens wrongful conviction »
“The issue has been percolating for many years and is suddenly capturing public attention more than it ever has before,” said Bennett Gershman, a Pace University law professor who has studied prosecutorial misconduct for nearly 40 years.
Gershman says the issue has hit a tipping point at the same time police behavior has come under scrutiny after the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and other people killed by cops.
The latest previously undisclosed settlement involving the Queens DA’s office was for Kareem Bellamy, who in July reached an $8 million settlement in a lawsuit that claimed he was wrongly arrested for a 1994 murder and sent to prison for 14 years.
[More New York] A 16-year ordeal for man who won $6.25M settlement from city over Queens wrongful conviction »
Bellamy’s suit alleged that Queens prosecutors withheld key evidence in the case that might have led a jury to exonerate him.
Bellamy settled a separate case with the state in 2015 for $2.75 million.
Former Queens District Attorney Richard Brown in 2017. (Barry Williams/New York Daily News)
In September, the city settled with Rhiann Taylor for $3 million, ending a lawsuit that also alleged Queens prosecutors withheld key evidence. Taylor served nine years in prison.
[More New York] Mayor-elect Adams wants to give Frank Serpico long deserved Medal of Honor certificate »
And late in November, school custodian Julio Negron settled for $6.25 million after he was convicted of a 2005 shooting and spent 10 years behind bars. He alleged Queens prosecutors withheld evidence that would have pointed to another suspect.
Increased scrutiny of city district attorneys’ offices has come from a group of law professors, who are trying to use the state’s courts grievance committees to highlight prosecutorial misconduct cases. The professors are fighting an uphill battle.
The group has filed complaints against 21 current and former Queens prosecutors. The city Law Department countered with a complaint to the grievance committees that says by going public with their complaints about prosecutors, the professors are “misus[ing] and indeed abus[ing] the grievance process to promote a political agenda” in a way that “should not be countenanced.”
[More New York] Man killed in bloody shooting inside Queens apartment »
And the grievance committees themselves converted the professors’ complaints into a private matter — which would prevent the public from knowing the results of their investigations, the professors complain in a federal lawsuit.
A 2018 state law established a commission with subpoena power to investigate and recommend discipline in prosecutorial misconduct cases. District attorneys have fought the measure at every step. After a judge ruled the commission was unconstitutional, legislators passed another law. That commission has not yet been set up.
It’s not clear how widespread the problems are in New York. Gershman said he knows of no database of prosecutorial misconduct cases.
[More New York] Rikers inmate breaks NYC correction officer’s nose with headbutt after refusing order to spit out blade »
Instead, he says, the belief that prosecutors improperly withhold evidence and engage in unfair tactics to win convictions is largely anecdotal.
“We are relying on cases where we can identify prosecutors and learn whether they were held accountable,” Gershman said. “This is the consensus among people who know about the system.”
Brown’s 28-year tenure as Queens DA has been a focus of criticism as his prosecutors have had a high number of convictions reversed, said Rudin, who has litigated prosecutorial misconduct cases for 25 years.
[More New York] Woman bystander shot in ear after gunman opens fire on Bronx street »
The Queens office was “an insulated community that operated without a lot of public scrutiny or accountability,” Rudin said.
“You had a very conservative, very powerful, mostly white prosecutor’s office with very little turnover,” he said. “The whole office, from the top down, developed the attitude that the ends justified the means. They thought they were trying to put bad people away and winning was much more important than fair play.”
Senior members of Brown’s staff admitted in depositions obtained by Rudin that there was little to no formal discipline after cases were overturned on misconduct grounds. Just one attorney has been forced out of the DA’s office for such violations since Brown took office in 1991.
[More New York] Shoplifter pulls gun on Bronx grocery store employee in caught-on-camera clash »
In a 2019 deposition, Ryan — Brown’s longtime and most senior aide — acknowledged no one had been suspended, demoted, lost vacation days or denied a promotion for failing to turn over exculpatory evidence to the defense or making improper statements during trial.
He also said he couldn’t recall a time an assistant district attorney got a negative evaluation for failing to turn over such evidence.
Julio Negron, left, and his lawyer Joel Rudin with a copy of a police report in his case. (Barry Williams/for New York Daily News)
After 2012, Brown created a Committee on Professional Standards, but in depositions taken in 2019, four veteran prosecutors said they had never even heard of the committee or received written disciplinary policies, with one saying, “That’s first time (I’m) hearing of it.”
[More New York] Man slashed with blade in unprovoked attack by deranged woman on Queens-bound train »
Brown’s committee never published its reviews or findings.
Rudin contends that the message from the top was that there were no consequences.
“I asked them if they ever tried to find out if ADAs [assistant district attorneys] understood at the time of their behavior if they were violating the rules, and they admitted they never asked them what their knowledge of the rules was when they acted,” Rudin said.
[More New York] Young teen beaten up, robbed in brutal caught-on-camera attack »
State appellate judges knew what went on in Brown’s office.
During oral argument in an appeal of a murder case in 2018, Judge Leonard Austin laid into the office for making exaggerations and improperly trying to play on the jury’s sympathy during opening and closing statements.
“I feel like a broken record because I address this every time or almost every time the Queens DA is before us,” Austin said. “I’m here nine years this week. It’s nine years of the same thing. At some point your office’s improprieties are going to get a guilty person walking.”
[More New York] Cops hunt for creep who tried to lure 9-year-old girl into van »
When the lawyer representing the DA’s office argued the summation was proper, a second judge, Sylvia Hines-Radix cut her off. “Here there is behavior that is pervasive and it’s disturbing to this bench,” she said.
The suspect in that case, Luis Cherry, was granted a new trial.
In an August 2018 hearing over an appeal of Jose Velez’s burglary conviction, the appellate panel once again made a broad criticism of the office over improper closing statements.
[More New York] Accused shoplifter drops cop who confronted him at Manhattan drug store »
“I could read this summation, and without knowing what office it’s from, would say it’s from Queens,” said Judge Robert Miller, according to a video of the hearing. “That’s the reputation that your office is building with this court, because this happens repeatedly.”
Robert Masters, a former top aide to Brown, says it’s wrong to assign sinister motives to the Queens DA’s office. “From our perspective, the notion that all of these matters are interconnected and it all starts from an original sin committed by Judge [Richard] Brown is not sustainable,” Masters said.
“At the end of the day, two things can be true at once. It can be that a mistake can happen and the defendant can receive some relief, but that doesn’t mean that mistake was the result of someone trying to cheat. ... I think we did as much training in this area as any office in the state.”
Rhiann Taylor settled a case with the city for $3 million in her lawsuit charging Queens prosecutors with withholding key evidence in her case. Taylor served nine years in prison. (Barry Williams/for New York Daily News)
Bellamy was 28 when he was convicted of the fatal 1994 stabbing of James Abbott in Far Rockaway. His conviction was overturned in 2007 and then dismissed in 2011.
His lawyers sued, alleging that detectives coerced witnesses. They also alleged payments to a key witness were not disclosed, and that the prosecutor made improper claims in his closing statements, including: “The evidence shows that you are a murderer and that you are not going to get away with it, not this time.” Under the state Rules of Professional Conduct, it’s improper for a lawyer to “assert a personal opinion as to the guilt or innocence of an accused.”
“I was able to get compensated out of a tragic injustice,” Bellamy told the Daily News. “This sends a message to prosecutors and to judges that some people get framed and some people, they don’t take the job they have seriously. The system needs to change and people need to be held accountable.”
[More New York] Mom of Rikers detainee laments dangerous conditions, lack of mental health services in the jails »
Brad Leventhal, one of the prosecutors who handled the hearing in the Bellamy case that led to the conviction being overturned, once insisted that Bellamy “has not – I repeat, he has not – been exonerated.”
Leventhal resigned in March after a judge ruled he and other prosecutors committed “egregious misconduct” in withholding key evidence in the unrelated case of three men exonerated after serving 24 years in prison in the 1996 slayings of an off-duty police officer and a check cashing store owner.
Metro: Kareem Bellamy, who spend 17 years in jail for the stabbing death of James Abbott, smiles as his murder conviction was overturned. Photo was taken at Queens Criminal Court located at 125-01 Queens Boulevard in Kew Gardens, New York on Friday, September 16, 2011. (DelMundo, Anthony freelance NYDN/Anthony DelMundo)
Taylor, now 35, was convicted for the 2007 slaying of Darion Brown in Laurelton. The state Court of Appeals overturned his conviction in 2015 and he was acquitted at retrial.
[More New York] Inmate dies at Rikers Island, becoming 15th death in NYC custody this year »
Taylor’s lawsuit alleged that a prosecutor failed to turn over evidence that two key witnesses had received benefits from the DA’s office that influenced their testimony. One of those witnesses told a judge in an unrelated hearing that he didn’t see the crime and that both he and the other key witness were intoxicated - then testified at trial that they were sober.
Former Queens District Attorney Richard Brown. (Mary Altaffer/AP)
Negron’s suit contended that an NYPD detective and the Queens prosecutor pressured the shooting victim into identifying Negron as the triggerman, and information about a possible second suspect was withheld from the defense.
Two courts concluded that the prosecutor misled the trial judge, leading to the case being overturned and then dismissed.
[More New York] NYC correction officer busted for pulling gun on Irving Plaza security guard »
One key piece of evidence in his case was a form shown to the victim during a lineup that identified Negron by name as the “suspect” and listed where in the lineup he would appear.
The form helped law enforcement convict Negron, said Rudin. “They took an uncertain witness, and led him to become a certain witness,” he explained.
The Queens District Attorney seal (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
A fundamental problem is that prosecutors’ zeal to get convictions often leads to misconduct, said Ellen Yaroshefsky, a Hofstra University law professor who studies the issue and worked as an expert in the Bellamy case.
“The courts have looked at this and found significant instances and patterns of misconduct, and DA’s offices should be proactive in creating projects and programs to overcome misconduct,” she said.
Yaroshefsky is surprised Bellamy, Taylor and Negron got their cases heard. “It’s remarkable that these plaintiffs were even able to get into court, much less succeed in a settlement, because most applications are denied and not treated seriously,” she said.
Queens DA Melinda Katz talks to reporters after voting in the Queens borough of New York, Tuesday, June 25, 2019. (Seth Wenig/AP)
Some district attorneys are reacting to the new scrutiny. Incoming Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg acknowledges a need for more oversight of prosecutors’ actions.
Bragg has said promotions will no longer be tied to prosecutors’ conviction rates, and he will have a “zero tolerance” policy when prosecutors fail to turn over evidence favorable to the defense.
[More New York] Hateful vandals draw swastika into wet cement outside Brooklyn home: video »
“The office will not treat willful hiding of evidence as something requiring ‘more training,’” Bragg wrote in his Day 1 Memo. “Those who engage in such conduct will be terminated.”
A spokesman for current Queens DA Melinda Katz insists she has revamped and broadened training, using the work of the office’s Conviction Integrity Unit. “(That unit) has brought into sharp focus the high ethical and procedural standards that are required to ensure the integrity of prosecutions,” the spokesman said.
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