Darryl Austin & Alvenna Jenette - Police Misconduct

Austin, Darryl AND Jenette, Alvenna ; murder; NRE: perjury, false accusation, prosecutor misconduct, police officer misconduct, withheld exculpatory evidence, knowingly permitting perjury

K20 "[ADA] Mark Hale and said the cases against Darryl Austin [and] Alveanna Jenette...were plagued by testimony from the same 'extremely problematic' and 'incredible' drug-addicted prosecution witness, Teresa Gomez, now deceased.

"Moreover, in the case against Jenette and Austin, Hale said a review by the conviction review unit showed that certain police notes 'indicated an alternative shooter' had committed the crime, but those notes were not turned over to the defense."

[This is much like the buried evidence in Nickel's case.]

"Austin died in prison after serving 14 years..."

[Austin] [562:745]; "[W]e are satisfied that the verdict was not against the weight of the evidence..."

NRE synopsis (by Maurice Possley):

"Shortly after midnight on September 10, 1985, two men chased 34-year-old Ronnie Durant from a location known for drug dealing in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn...They caught up to him, shot and killed him and stole his money.

"Durant's nephew told police that two half-brothers, 21-year-old Alvena Jenette and 22-year-old Darryl Austin, were responsible, but no arrests were made because the police determined the nephew was not a credible witness. Police interviewed another witness who said the brothers had helped rob Durant, but a different man shot him.

"A third witness told police that the brothers had nothing to do with the crime, and provided the name of the man who robbed and shot Durant and the location of the gun. The detective's notes said that the witness told him that Austin 'was there but he did not do anything.' The notes said Jenette was standing on a stoop but 'Did not do anything.'

"These notes were not disclosed for nearly 30 years.

"More than a year after the murder of Durant, on January 10, 1987, 27-year-old Donald Manboardes, a drug dealer, was murdered in Crown Heights. On March 13, 1987, a drug addict and crack seller in the neighborhood named Teresa Gomez told police that 26-year-old Robert Hill, a drug dealer who was also a half-brother of Jenette and Austin, had murdered Manboardes. Hill was arrested, questioned and released after he denied involvement. A week later, Detective Louis Scarcella said Gomez came back and told him that Hill was also responsible for the murder of Bruce Siblings in Crown Heights in December 1986 -- a month before Manboardes was slain.

"Hill was then arrested and charged with the murders of Manboardes and Siblings.

"After Hill was charged, Hill went on trial in Kings County...Court for the Siblings murder. At the trial, Gomez testified that she was hiding in a closet in a crack house and looked through a keyhole to see Hill put a pillow over Siblings' head and shoot him. On cross-examination, Hill's defense attorney questioned Gomez about the Manboardes murder, but she told the jury that she had not seen that shooting. She admitted she had been arrested for prostitution and selling crack, but denied using crack, although she said she usually sold crack for three or four days straight at a time without sleeping.

"The defense called an investigator who had visited the scene of the shooting and testified there was no keyhole in the door of the closet where Gomez said she was hiding at the time Siblings was shot.

"Hill was acquitted of the Siblings murder and then went on trial for the Manboardes murder. Despite her testimony in the Siblings case that she had not witnessed the Manboardes murder, Gomez told the Manboardes jury that she saw Hill and Manboardes quarrelling on the street about drugs. She said that Hill drew a pistol and shot Manboardes, and then Hill and another man dragged Manboardes into a taxi. The taxi driver said a man he could not identify told him that Manboardes was his brother and to take him to a hospital.

"Another woman who was a drug user and an associate of Manboardes said she later heard Hill, during a conversation with an acquaintance, claim that he had killed one man and wasn't afraid to kill again.

"Hill's defense attorney was informed that three other witnesses who were present at the shooting would testify that Hill was not the gunman, but that Hill did help put Manboardes into a cab after he was shot. Those witnesses, however, were not called to testify.

"In 1988, a jury convicted Hill of second-degree murder for the Manboardes homicide and he was sentenced to 18 years to life in prison.

"After Hill was convicted, Jenette and Austin went on trial together in Kings County...Court in 1988 for the murder of Durant. Both were convicted almost solely on the basis of the testimony of Gomez. The police notes that a witness to the shooting had said neither man was involved were not disclosed to the defense.

"In 1988, Jenette and Austin were both convicted of second degree murder and sentenced to 18 years to life in prison. Jenette never saw his brother again -- Austin died in prison in 2000. Jenette was paroled in 2007.

"In 2011, Kings County [DA] Charles Hynes created a Conviction Integrity Unit and invited defense attorneys to present cases in which innocent defendants may have been convicted. One case that unit learned about was that of David Ranta who -- like Hill, Jenette, and Austin -- was convicted of murder based on an investigation by Detective Louis Scarcella (who had retired in 1999). The Conviction Integrity Unit's investigaton found that one witness had been told to pick Ranta in a lineup, and that two prosecution witnesses -- both convicted felons -- were allowed to leave jail, smoke crack and have sex with prostitutes in return for implicating Ranta.

"In March 2013, Ranta's conviction was vacated, the charge was dismissed and he was released from prison.

"A few months later, The New York Times published an article accusing Scarcella of misconduct in many investigations: fabricating evidence, coercing witnesses and concealing evidence of defendants' innocence. The article reported that Gomez had somehow testified as an eyewitness in six separate murder cases. The report prompted the Brooklyn Conviction Integrity Unit to begin to re-investigate 57 cases in which Scarcella was involved.

"Kings County [DA] Ken Thompson, who defeated Hynes in his bid for re-election in the fall of 2013, concluded that as a result of the Conviction Integrity Unit's investigation, the convictions of Austin, Jennette and Hill would be vacated and the charges dismissed.

"'Based on a comprehensive review of these cases, it is clear that testimony from the same problematic witness undermined the integrity of these convictions, and resulted in an unfair trial for each of these defendants,' Thompson said in a statement issued May 6, 2014.

"That same day, on the motion of the [DA's] office, the charges against all three defendants were vacated and dismissed. Hill, who was scheduled to be paroled in less than a month, was released immediately.

"Hill, Jennette and Austin's mother, acting on behalf of Austin's estate, sued for compensation, alleging the defendants were framed by Scarcella. Utimately, they reached settlements with the city and state of New York. Hill received $11 million, Jennette was awarded $8,717,000 and Austin's estate was awarded $5.5 million."

[All emphases added unless otherwise noted.]