Samuel Brownridge Jr. - Overwhelming Evidence

Brownridge, Jr., Samuel; murder; NRE: mistaken witness identification, perjury/false accusation, inadequate legal defense, prosecutor misconduct, police officer misconduct, withheld exculpatory evidence, misconduct that is not withholding evidence, witness tampering or misconduct interrogating co-defendant, perjury by official; "OVERWHELMING"

[699:897]; 2nd Dept. 12/13/99; affirmed

"In light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt..."

 

[The Second Department 'justices' who signed off on this were: David S. Ritter, Thomas R. Sullivan, Gloria Goldstein, and Howard Miller. ]

 

2010 WL 2816265; E.D.N.Y. 2/19/10; magistrate herein recommends denial of writ; subsequently denied

"The prosecution's case rested in large part on the testimony of two eyewitnesses. The first, Kevin Boatwright, testified that, on the evening of March 7, 1994, he was walking on Mexico Street towards Quencer Road, in St. Albans, Queens, when he saw four men about a block ahead of him. One of the men was...Brownridge [???], and another was in a wheelchair...Brownridge and one of the other men men approached Boatwright. Boatwright said, 'What's up?' and [Brownridge] responded, 'What do you mean, what's up, motherfucker,' pulled out a gun and put it to Boatwright's head...The other man pulled his gun as well...Boatwright explained to the men that he didn't have any money and that he was on his way home...Brownridge put his gun down and started to walk away; the other man, with his gun still drawn, started walking backwards away from Boatwright."

"Boatwright did not turn around to leave because he was afraid he would get shot in the back...He then saw his friend Darryle Adams walking towards the four men, but Adams could not see Boatwright because of a van parked in the street...As Adams approached the men, one of them pulled out a gun, and Adams put his hands in the air...Adams got on his knees and started pleading for his life...The man in the wheelchair rolled over to Adams and hit him in the face with a bottle...[Brownridge] then walked up to Adams and shot him in the back of the head."

"On March 14, 1994, Boatwright identified Brownridge from a police lineup as the person who shot Adams...Boatwright also identified [Brownridge] at trial as the man who held a gun to his head and who shot Adams...Boatwright testified that he did not know [Brownridge] before March 7, 1994, and that he had never been in a prior altercation with him."

"Quentin Hagood witnessed Adams' murder as well. On March 7, 1994, Hagood was sitting outside a friend's house on Mexico Street when he saw Adams, whom he knew as Peanut, kneeling down surrounded by a group of people...Hagood saw the man in the wheelchair hit Adams in the back of the head...Hagood and [Brownridge] had gone to school together...and Hagood knew [Brownridge] by his nickname Mooky...Hagood later identified Brownridge as the shooter during a lineup at the 113th Precinct.

"Police Officer Michael Sullivan responded to the scene at 9:00 p.m....Sullivan searched the area and found a hat, a pocket knife, and .380 shell casings."

"Detective [Raymond L.] Medina responded to the scene after 9 p.m. and observed broken glass with liquid on or near it, [and] blood and shell casings on the street...Detective Medina interviewed Boatwright and Hagood, which led him to focus the investigation on [Brownridge]...Detective Medina arrested [Brownridge] on March 14, 1994, one week after the shooting...At the time of his arrest, [Brownridge] said his nickname was Mooky."

"[Brownridge's] father, Samuel Brownridge, Sr., testified that [his son] himself had been the victim of a shooting about six months prior to Adams' murder, and that two of [the younger Brownridge's] friends were killed during the earlier shooting incident (the 'October' shooting)...According to [the] father, prior to the Adams murder, Detective Medina had come to his home five or six times to talk to [his son] about the October shooting. Hattie Brownridge, [the] mother, also testified that Detective Medina had been to her home prior to the Adams murder...One time, when Detective Medina was in her home, he threatened to put [her son] in jail if [he] did not cooperate with his investigation into the October shooting...Mrs.Brownridge also testified that [her son's] friends came to her home all the time and that [her son] did not have a friend who used a wheelchair."

"[Brownridge tesified at trial] that he had been in a prior verbal altercation with Boatwright on January 6, 1994...[He] also testified that, during an incident on October 1, 1993, he was shot and two of his friends were killed...Brownridge testified that Detective Medina investigated the October shooting and asked [him] to come to the precinct, but that [he] refused...At one point, Detective Medina came to [Brownridge's] home and threatened to arrest [him] if he did not testify about the October shooting ...After [Brownridge's] arrest for the Adams murder, Detective Medina visited [him] in jail and told him that, if he testified against the perpetrator of the October shooting, he would 'walk away' on the charge of murdering Adams."

126 N.Y.S.3d 894; Queens Cty. Ct. 6/24/20; motion to vacate granted

"[Brownridge's appellate counsel argued] that another man, Garfield Brown, was the real perpetrator of Darryle Adams' murder."

"[Brownridge] contends that he has established, by clear and convincing evidence, his factual innocence. After a reinvestigation of this matter, the [DA's office] joined in Brownridge's motion. They now also believe that Garfield Brown, and not Brownridge, shot and killed Darryle Adams. The Court...agrees with this conclusion."

"On March 9, 1994, two days after the shooting, Boatwright was shown two six-photograph arrays; each contained a picture of a suspect that the police had developed. Boatwright picked out the two suspects, identifying one as the man who shot Adams and the other as the man in the wheelchair who struck Adams with a bottle. In subsequent lineup procedures, however, Boatwright was unable to identify either man (and, in fact, neither had anything to do with the murder). Consequently, the arrests of these initial suspects were voided. Both sets of identification procedures were documented in a memorandum prepared by an [ADA] who was present at the 113th Precinct Staton house for the lineups. But the photo array misidentifications were left out of a police report concerning the lineups.

"Four days later, another witness, Quentin Hagood -- who was described during Brownridge's trial as 'very slow' and said to be living 'in a home wth other mentally challenged people' -- told detectives that, on the night of Adams's murder, he had seen a group of four men that included an individual he knew as 'Mookie' fleeing from the scene of the shooting. One of the detectives recognized 'Mookie' as Brownridge's nickname. As a result of this development, Brownridge's photograph was put in photo arrays that were shown to Boatwright and Hagood. Both witnesses picked Brownridge out of the arrays, and identified him again when he was placed in a lineup.

"Brownridge was indicted for, among other offenses, three counts of second-degree murder and one count of attempted first-degree robbery. None of the other men allegedly involved in the shooting were ever arrested.

"In the spring of 1995, Brownridge went to trial...The jury...never learned that Boatwright had mistakenly identified two men in photo arrays who were not involved in Adams's murder."

"In addition to not learning about Boatwright's misidentifications, the jury also never heard from several alibi witnesses that Brownridge proffered during trial. The [prosecution] objected to the testimony on the ground that Brownridge had neglected to provide timely notice of it...and Justice [Robert] Hanophy precluded it."

"In the summer of 1999, Brownridge filed a...motion to vacate the judgment...He claimed that his trial attorney's failure to submit timely alibi notice deprived him of his right to effective assistance of counsel. In their response to Brownridge's motion, the [prosecution] stated, incorrectly, that Darryle Adams had been murdered at around 11:00 p.m. (about two hours later than the crime actually occurred) -- a fact Justice Hanophy relied upon to a significant extent in denying the motion..."

"[A] man named Mark Taylor, who had been arrested in Florida and extradited to New York, told New York detectives that he was present at a Queens homicide that had occurred several years earlier, and that the wrong man had been arrested and convicted for the crime. Taylor's information was passed on to the Queens County [DA's] Office, and [ADA] Richard Schaeffer was assigned to look into it. Taylor ultimately told ADA Schaeffer that he, Dean Hoskins, Darren Lee, and Garfield Brown comprised the group of four men involved in Darryle Adams's death. Garfield Brown -- a violent career criminal who was killed in May of 2002, when [U.S.] Marshals tried to apprehend him in North Carolina in connection with unrelated murders in Connecticut and New York -- was the shooter, Taylor said. And Darren Lee, who used a wheelchair, was the man who had struck Adams with a bottle."

"[D]uring his [subsequent hearing] testimony, Hoskins observed that Brownridge looked a 'lot' like Garfield Brown."

"Justice Hanophy denied the motion...[He] dismissed as incredible the evidence that Garfield Brown was Darryle Adams's killer, primarily because the allegations were not brought to law enforcement's attention until after Brown was dead and thus 'not able to refute [them]'..."

"In rejecting Brownridge's claim that Justice Hanophy had denied him due process at the [motion to vacate] hearing, [Chief Justice Frank Dearie of] the District Court [for the Eastern District of New York] praised Justice Hanophy for 'putting an end to the charade' that had been perpetrated by individuals who 'themselves may have had a role in the killing [who] were seeking to shift the blame to the deceased Garfield Brown'..."

"Several years would pass without any further litigation related to this matter. But, in 2017, Brownridge was fortunate enough to secure pro bono representation from the law firm of Barket Epstein Kearon Aldea & LeTurco. The firm undertook a reinvestigation of the case, which included interviewing witnesses and obtaining documents through Freedom of Information Law requests. Brownridge's new lawyers, led by Donna Aldea, became convinced that Garfield Brown was, in fact, Darryle Adams's killer.

"Consequently, in the fall of 2018, Ms. Aldea reached out to executives at the [DA's] office and asked them to reexamine Brownridge's case as a possible wrongful conviction. The Office agreed to do so and assigned ADA Schaeffer...to lead the investigation."

[Some other points jointly emphasized by the DA's office and Brownridge's lawyers were:]

-- Quentin Hagood's recantation, in 2019, of his trial testimony...

-- Recent statements from two individuals, Michael Saxton and James Goodwin, who claimed to have been in Goodwin's car on the night of Adams's murder, when Mark Taylor approached them, got in the backseat of the car, and said that 'Garfield' had just shot someone for no reason.

-- A statement from Andre Devieux, a friend of Garfield Brown and the godfather of Brown's son, recounting that Brown called him one evening in March (Devieux could not recall the year) and said that he was 'bugging and not going to drink anymore.' Brown then reportedly told Devieux that he had been with 'Bear' (Mark Taylor), Darren Lee, and another individual whose name Devieux could not remember, when they 'came upon this dude.' Brown told the man to get on his knees. Lee then hit the man in the head with a bottle and Brown shot him, Devieux recalled Brown telling him."

---

"Watch the Video: Brownridge Murder Exoneration Hearing, and Judge's Call for Reforms," [no author], New York Law Journal, 6/25/20

"On Tuesday, Samuel Brownridge, a 45-year-old man who grew up in Queens, was exonerated of murder after wrongly serving 25 years in prison upstate for it."

"'The miscarriage of justice in your case was monumental,' [Justice Joseph] Zayas said to Brownridge at the hearing. 'It is therefore no surprise that large segments of our city and our country have grave doubts about our criminal justice system and its ability to deliver equal and fair justice to all.'"

from NRE synopsis (by Maurice Possley):

"Boatwright's original description of the gunman was a man with a fade haircut -- with shaved sides -- but at the trial he testified the gunman had a short Afro, which was what Brownridge's hair was at the time."

[The only reasonable explanation for this change in description is that Boatwright was 'influenced' by detectives and/or the prosecutor.]

"Hagood originally told police that he was sitting on the porch of a friend's home on Mexico Street when he heard gunfire and saw 'Mookie' run past. However, now he told the jury that he actually saw the shooting, although the layout of the street and crime scene photos showed it was impossible to see the shooting from his vantage point on the porch. He said he saw Adams kneeling on the ground and get hit with a beer bottle. Hagood claimed he could smell the beer, though he was at least 60 feet away.

[Hagood, characterized as 'very slow,' was undoubtedly quite easy for 'the authorities' to manipulate into telling the story they wanted him to.]

"He also claimed that there was a crowd around Adams during the shooting, but that he was the only one who heard the gunfire. He said he was sitting outside because it was warm, although the temperature was actually below freezing. Hagood said his vision was 20-20, but then said he needed glasses to read an exhibit and actually saw better when it was dark."

"Hagood signed an affidavit in 2019 stating that Boatwright believed that Brownridge was the gunman and 'pressured' Hagood to tell police that he was the shooter. 'I told Kevin Boatwright that it wasn't right and I didn't want to say that Brownridge was the shooter because I did not think he was the shooter. But Kevin had already told the police that I saw Brownridge shoot [Adams]. That was a lie.'

"Hagood said he told police that he didn't think Brownridge was the gunman, but 'they thought he did it and they pressured me to identify him. They said I would go to jail if I didn't testify against Brownridge. I was young and I was afraid to go to jail.'

"'At the lineup, the police detective showed me one single photograph,' Hagood said in the affidavit. 'It was Samuel Brownridge. . .The police wanted me to say he was the shooter.'"

"On March 11, 2019, Brownridge was released on parole.

"Brownridge received $239,583 in 2021 in state compensation...In August 2021, Brownridge filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Medina and the City of New York, which was settled for $13 million."

[All emphases added unless otherwise noted.]