Two US citizens, who had been in prison for decades for two separate crimes, were acquitted yesterday after two New York courts found their convictions flawed and overturned. Yet another embarrassing case for the Big Apple police department; two convictions in this case based on false statements and procedural errors.
The murders occurred eight blocks apart over nine months in a Harlem neighborhood, near the height of New York City’s drug wars. It says from Monday New York TimesTwo otherwise unrelated murder cases have one thing in common: The convicted men were acquitted in a Manhattan courtroom. They are the latest in a long line of mostly black and Hispanic New Yorkers whose names have been cleared after decades in prison.
Wayne Gardine and Jabar Walker
Wayne Gardine, one of the two men released, spent more than 18 years in prison for a murder that occurred in 1994 at the height of New York’s cocaine and crack epidemic. Although he was acquitted and served his full sentence, he now faces extradition to his native Jamaica. The only evidence against him was the words of a drug dealer who changed his story several times with glaring inconsistencies.
The other, Jabar Walker, was sentenced to life in prison for killing two people in 1995 in the same area as the murder for which Gardine was convicted. The woman, who said she witnessed the conflict, said she received “financial assistance” from the district attorney’s office to move to a new apartment. Another witness was tried for a crime that was reduced to a misdemeanor in exchange for giving false testimony.
“Jabar Walker, who was 23 years old at the time of his conviction, was released from prison today after serving 25 years,” the New York District Attorney’s Office said. The office decided to release the two men after reviewing objections from the Legal Aid Society, an association that helps poor people pursue their rights. From 1989 to the present, at least 115 murder convictions have been overturned in New York City; A significant portion of the 1,300 convictions overturned nationwide across the United States.
Source: Today IT
Karen Clayton is a seasoned journalist and author at The Nation Update, with a focus on world news and current events. She has a background in international relations, which gives her a deep understanding of the political, economic and social factors that shape the global landscape. She writes about a wide range of topics, including conflicts, political upheavals, and economic trends, as well as humanitarian crisis and human rights issues.
