By Curtis Skinner
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Former convicts, inmates’ families and legal activists called on the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office on Wednesday to fast-track its reviews of questionable murder convictions linked to cases involving a retired former homicide detective.
Their pleas followed the release from prison on Tuesday of Jonathan Fleming, 51, whose murder conviction was vacated after he spent almost 25 years in prison.
Fleming’s case was investigated by the Conviction Review Unit, set up by the District Attorney’s office to look at murder convictions involving retired police Detective Louis Scarcella.
Cases linked to Scarcella came under scrutiny after The New York Times began reporting on instances in which the detective relied on the same eyewitness, a drug-addicted prostitute, for multiple murder prosecutions, and also that he delivered confessions from suspects who later denied making an admission.
Scarcella has defended his record.
“This is not one case. This is not two cases,” said Derrick Hamilton at a rally at City Hall.
Hamilton was released on parole in 2011 after spending more than two decades in prison for what he said was a wrongful murder conviction in a case involving Scarcella.