Bell, Bolt & Johnson - Prosecutor & Police Misconduct

Bell, George AND Bolt, Rohan AND Johnson, Gary; murder; NRE:

(all 3) perjury/false accusation, prosecutor misconduct, police officer misconduct, withheld exculpatory evidence, misconduct that is not withholding evidence, witness tampering or misconduct interrogating co-defendant

(Bell) mistaken witness identification, false confession, inadequate legal defense, misconduct in interrogation of exoneree

(Bolt) mistaken witness identification, knowingly permitting perjury (Johnson) false confession, knowingly permitting perjury, misconduct in interrogation of exoneree

Suggestibility issues

[Bell] [763:762]; 2nd Dept. 8/25/03; affirmed

"[Bell] was convicted of numerous crimes, including six counts of murder...in connection with the attempted robbery of a check-cashing store in Queens and the shooting death of the store owner and his security guard. From a store across the steet from where the crimes occurred, a witness saw [Bell] [???] and another man approach the two victims and enter the check-cashing store with them. The witness then heard shots and saw [Bell] and his accomplice leave the store. That witness subsequently identified [Bell] at a lineup. [Bell] later confessed to his participation in the crimes."

[Bell] 2008 WL 2484585; E.D.N.Y. 6/20/08; writ denied, but Certificate of Appealability granted

"The evidence at trial established that [at about 7 a.m on December 21, 1996], while three accomplices -- John Mark Bigweh, Gary Johnson, and a man named 'Jason' -- waited outside, Bell and another accomplice, Rohan Bolt, entered the store just as it opened for the day. They then demanded money from the owner, Ira 'Mike' Epstein, but before Epstein could open the safe, Bell [???] fired three shots into the store's security guard, off-duty [NYPD] Officer Charles Davis.* Bell then shot Epstein. As both men lay dying, Bell and his accomplices fled, without having gained access to the safe. Police later recovered four discharged 9 mm shell casings from the scene."

[* The fact that a police officer (albeit off-duty) was murdered undoubtedly made this a 'heater' case -- one detectives were under particular pressure to 'solve' quickly. Such pressure often leads to the taking of short-cuts, and wrongful convictions.]

"Bell was arrested after he left his home with Gary Johnson, shortly after 11:50 p.m. on December 24, 1996. Johnson and another man, Mendez Collier, were also arrested at the same time...Bell denied any involvement, but, when informed that other suspects were telling police their stories, he said that he had been involved as a lookout on the corner of 95th Street and Astoria Boulevard and had carried a .380 automatic handgun. Bell proceeded to describe in detail what occurred inside the store, relating facts which he could not have known if he were only a lookout. Moreover, the ballistics evidence, of which [interrogating Detective Louis] Pia was aware, established that a 9 mm weapon was used. When pressed on this score, Bell began to cry and admitted being in the store with a 9 mm weapon. He said he and 'Roti' (Rohan Bolt) entered the store and pointed guns at Epstein and Davis while 'Gary' (Gary Johnson) and 'Carl' (Mendez Collier) served as lookouts and 'Jason,' the getaway driver, sat at the wheel of a burgundy van with Pennsylvania license plates. Bell also admitted to firing the shots that killed Epstein and Davis...Bell repeated his confession on videotape...More than two hours after Bell had videotaped his statement, Detectives Pia and [Richard] Sica visited Bell in his holding cell and asked him why he alone had implicated Collier...Bell said that he falsely accused Collier because he feared that if he implicated John Mark Bigweh, the actual lookout, he and his family would be in danger."

"Lieutenant Nevins testified that, afer speaking with Bigweh, he convened a meeting 'of police officers and detectives who [were] going to go out on the street and apprehend' Bell and his accomplices...Bigweh accompanied the police officers, and he led them to the various locations where each of the individuals resided and 'he pointed them out to [them].'...Moreover, as a result of a telephone call Bigweh placed to [Bell], he and Gary Johnson left [Bell's] apartment (in the same neighborhood as the scene of the crime) and were arrested on the street by Lieutenant Nevins and others."

[all 3] 143 N.Y.S.3d 840; Queens Cty. Ct. 3/8/21; all convictions reversed, due to to Brady violations

"Before sunrise on Saturday December 21, 1996, Ira 'Mike' Epstein and off-duty Police Officer Charles Davis were shot and killed during an attempted robbery of Epstein's check-cashing store at 94-21 Astoria Boulevard, in East Elmhurst, Queens. An aggressive, all-hands-on-deck investigation by the [NYPD] began almost immediately. But, despite an exhaustive canvass, the descriptions of the perpetrators that the police were able to obtain from witnesses who had seen either portions of the crime itself, or the events that preceded or followed it, were not particularly illuminating. There was, however, near unanimity about the fact that the perpetrators had travelled to and from the scene in a blue van.

"The [DA's] office obtained medical records...which included information that Bigweh had a history of experiencing 'AH' [auditory hallucinations] of his dead mother at stressful times...None of these records, which were in the [DA's] file related to this case, were disclosed to the attorneys representing Bell, Bolt, and Johnson, despite specific requests for information of this sort having been made."

"On May 9, 1997, while pre-trial proceedings were moving forward in Bell, Bolt, and Johnson's case, three men ambushed an armored car delivering payroll in Flushing Queens...Three men were ultimately arrested: Aaron Boone, Robert Majors, and Bernard Johnson.

"On May 12, 1997...the Daily News published an article about the armored car robbery. The article reported that 'Boone and Majors are suspects in other payroll heists in Queens, including a December ambush that killed a check-cashing firm owner and off-duty Police Officer Charles Davis...'"

"The May 9, 1997 armored car robbery was not the first time that Aaron Boone had come to the attention of the police and the Queens [DA's] Office. In fact, they had been investigating him and his twin-brother Ammon for several months. The Boones were believed to be the leaders of a violent robbery crew known as 'Speedstick.' One focus of the Speedstick investigation was the murder, on March 8, 1997, of an alleged Boones' associate, Jamal Clark."

"Several weeks later, on May 16, 1997, a witness the parties refer to as Witness #1 was interviewed at the 109th Precinct in connection with the investigation of the armored car robbery. The information that Witness #1 provided was documented in a DD5 [report] authored by Detective Calantjis. (Three other detectives, including Detective Heider, were also present.) According to the report, Witness #1 identified several members of the gang. He also described a series of crimes the gang had committed, some of which Witness #1 admitted participating in himself.

"Among these crimes was the robbery of a 'check-cashing store on Astoria [Boulevard]' that Witness #1 said 'the group [had] robbed.' 'This job,' Witness #1 explained, 'was set up by the Boone twins.' Jamal Clark was outsde and 'something went bad'; no money was taken. Witness #1 said Clark told him about this crime during a phone call, when he (Clark) was 'down south' with the Boone twins at a club they owned. Clark told Witness #1 he was concerned that the twins would kill him because he knew [too] much and could tell the police.'"

"The Daily News story reporting a connection between the armored car robbery and the Epstein/Davis murders quite understandably piqued the interest of the attorneys representing Bell, Bolt, and Johnson. It sparked a flurry of discovery demands to the [DA's] Office, requesting any information in its possession, or in the posssession of the NYPD, implicating the defendants from the armored car heists in these crimes."

"George Bell was tried first, in the spring of 1999...Aside from Bell's own statement [i.e., (false) confession], an eyewitness, Gregory Turnbull, identified Bell as one of the perpetrators he had seen outside of the check-cashing store on the morning of the murders. But Turnbull's closest vantage point was nearly 200 feet away, and the crime occurred before sunrise."

"Bigweh's cooperation allowed him to avoid a homicide conviction. He pleaded guilty to attempted robbery...and criminal possession of a weapon...and was sentenced to...five to ten years...In 2003, he was deported to Liberia."

[Bolt] [743:996]; 2nd Dept. 6/3/02; affirmed

"[W]e are satisfied that the verdict of guilt was not against the weight of the evidence..."

[Johnson] [743:289]; 2nd Dept. 6/3/02; affirmed

"[W]e are satisfied that the verdict of guilt was not against the weight of the evidence..."

G34 "'Mindboggling' Misconduct by Queens Prosecutors, Bennett L.Gershman, New York Law Journal, 3/17/21.

"That is how [County] Court Justice Joseph A. Zayas characterized the conduct of two prosecutors in the Queens [DA's] Office who he found responsible for engineering the wrongful convictions of three men for a double murder in Elmhurst Queens 25 years ago. In his 29-page decision filed last week, Judge Zayas meticulously documented how the two prosecutors, Charles Testagrossa, then Chief of the Major Crimes Bureau and Brad Leventhal, currently Chief of the Homicide Bureau, abdicated their constitutonal and ethical duties and denied the defendants a fair trial."

"As Testagrossa and Leventhal began preparing for trial, an event occurred which drastically altered the trajectory of the case by strongly suggesting that other persons may have committed the check-cashing store murders and that the defendants were innocent. In May 1997, an armored car delivering a payroll was ambushed in Queens and an off-duty police officer and retired detective guarding the truck were shot multiple times, almost fatally. Three men were arrested for the heist -- Aaron Boone, Robert Majors and Bernard Johnson. The Daily News reported that these individuals were suspects in the December check-cashing store murders."

"[M]ore than anyone in the DA's office, Testagrossa and Leventhal were acutely aware of the connection between the armored car heist and the check-cashing ambush. They also knew how significant a threat it posed to winning convictions, especially if the defense lawyers had access to the police reports, witnesses, and ballistics comparisons, and the logical argument that the same participants committed both robberies. Indeed, Testagrossa himself had made handwritten notes describing this connection, and actually used those notes in prosecuting Speedstick members for other crimes, including the Jamal Clark murder. But in the prosecutions of Bell, Bolt, and Johnson, Testagrossa buried* those notes."

[* Much like the buried evidence in Nickel's case.]

"And astonishingly, when the lawyers for Bell, Bolt, and Johnson repeatedly made requests before trial and again during trial for any exculpatory evidence, especially evidence that might prove that other persons may have committed the check-cashing store crimes, Testagrossa and Leventhal flatly denied there was any connection between the two robberies...They mocked the defense lawyers for wasting the court's time making frivolous motions...And taking a cue from prosecutors, [Judge Arthur Cooperman] chastised the defense lawyers for their 'fishing expedition in the Sahara Desert.'

"As Judge Zayas correctly found: 'The prosecution completely abdicated its truth-seeking role,* perhaps because it feared that evidence being sought by the defense would substantially undermine the likelihood of obtaining a conviction."

[* Yet more shades of the Nickel case.]

from NRE synopsis (by Maurice Possley):

"Both [Bell and Johnson] said detectives had physically abused them."

[Bigweh said a red van was used in the crime. His involvement in the case began with a marijuana arrest.]

"[A] woman told detectives that she bought crack cocaine from a man driving a red van.* She rode with detectives canvassing the area until they saw a red van** driven by 35-year-old Rohan Bolt, the owner of a Jamaican restaurant on nearby Northern Boulevard. Bolt said he was delivering laundry for his mother and denied involvement. He then was arrested."

[* It is not at all clear what if any connection this alleged crack sale had with the check-cashing store crimes. In any event, other witnesses would say the (latter) perpetrators actually used a blue van.]

[** So, these 'detectives' apparently just drove around until they found a (i.e., ANY) red van. It was pure chance that it ended up being Rohan Bolt's. (And why would the perpetrators hang around the neighborhood where they'd just committed such horrific crimes anyway?) ]

"In May 1997, police arrested Jason Ligon...After an interrogation, Ligon said he drove the van on the night of the crime. He was not prosecuted, however. Evidence showed he was in Washington, D.C. at the time of the crime. * The prosecution did not dismiss charges against Ligon until June of 2000 -- after Bell, Johnson, and Bolt had been convicted."**

[* So, now we actually see a third false confession connected with this case. Those 'detectives' sure were good at getting them.]

[** The cynicism here is breathtaking: Before dropping charges against Ligon, who they knew could not have been involved in the crime, prosecutors wanted to make sure they got these other (also innocent) guys convicted. It can only be concluded that had these three been acquitted, they would then have put Ligon on trial.]

"The prosecution's case rested on Bell's confession, Turnbull's identification, and the testimony of Reginald Gousse, who claimed Bell and Johnson admitted their involvement in the crime to him while they were incarcerated at Rikers Island prior to trial.

"Gousse was facing decades in prison for two robberies and as a result of his cooperation, he ultimately got five years."

[ Charles Testagrossa and Brad Leventhal resigned within weeks of the (above) Zayas decision.]

"Bell, Bolt, and Johnson filed compensation claims in the New York Court of Claims in July 2021. Bell, Johnson, and Bolt filed federal civil rights lawsuits in June 2022 against the City of New York and several police officers involved in their wrongful conviction.]

[All emphases added unless otherwise noted.]