Stole my liberty – don’t rob me again
Wrongly convicted man still awaits $18M
THEY TOOK away his freedom — and now they keep trying to take away his money.
The city is doubling down its efforts to stop Alan Newton, who spent 22 years behind bars for a rape he didn’t commit, from collecting the $18 million verdict a jury awarded him in 2010.
“This is a journey that started in 1984, and it’s still going on because the city refuses to take any responsibility,” Newton told the Daily News on Thursday.
Manhattan Federal Court Judge Shira Scheindlin had set aside the jury verdict in 2011, arguing Newton wasn’t entitled to the money because the city didn’t violate his civil rights.
But the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals reversed Scheindlin’s decision last Feb. 26, reinstating the monumental verdict. The federal appeals court also rejected the city’s request to rehear the appeal.
The city Law Department then tried to fight that ruling in the U.S. Supreme Court, but the high court declined to hear the case earlier this month, according to court documents.
But the city is still refusing to pay up.
The city Law Department claims in new court papers the Second Circuit didn't weigh “whether the amount of the damages was appropriate” and “did not address the question whether the separate verdict on damages was excessive.”
All the appeals court did was decide whether the city was at fault for Newton’s wrongful incarceration, the city lawyers argue — and they now
want Scheindlin to reduce the award.
Newton said the city’s efforts feel like an extension of an ordeal that began over 30 years ago, when he was arrested and then convicted of raping a woman in abandoned Bronx building and slashing her in the face with a razor.
The victim had picked him out of a lineup, and he was sentenced to 13 to 40 years in prison for rape, robbery and assault.
Newton’s petitions for parole were shot down three times, and law enforcement officials claimed the victim’s rape kit had disappeared — preventing him from proving his innocence.
The Innocence Project asked the Bronx District Attorney in 2005 to search for the rape kit. An extensive search yielded the evidence, and post-conviction DNA testing proved Newton’s innocence.
He was exonerated in 2006, and left prison penniless.
He sued the city, and the case went to trial in 2010 because the city wouldn’t make a fair offer, Newton said.
“I was willing to take $5 million. They refused. They only offered $1 million, which was their way of saying they don't even want to talk,” said Newton, who now earns some $30,000 per year working part-time for CUNY’s Black Male Initiative, which seeks to bolster graduation rates for men of color.
His lawyer, John Schutty, said the city already had a chance to appeal these issues and didn’t. “It’s always something new. Anything they can raise to stall payment, they raise,” he said.
Nick Paolucci, a Law Department spokesman, said the city simply disputes the $18 million award.
“We are not contesting the verdict, just (that) it’s excessive compared to similar cases,” he said.