David McCallum, 45, walked away from court a free man on Wednesday (Oct. 15) after serving 29 years for charges on kidnapping and murder. Prosecutors now say he and friend William Stuckey, 16 at the time, didn’t commit the crime of abducting 20-year-old Nathan Blenner in Ozone Park, Queens, before killing him with a gunshot to the head.
Via NYMag:
The boys quickly recanted, and an examination by the Conviction Review Unit established by recently elected Brooklyn DISTRICT ATTORNEYKenneth Thompson found their confessions contained numerous contradictions and details that were apparently fed to them. Thompson said there “is not a single piece of evidence” connecting the two men to the crime, and slammed his predecessor Charles Hynes, saying, “I inherited a legacy of disgrace with respect to wrongful convictions.” Investigations by the new review unit have led to eight convictions being vacated this year.
Unfortunately, the exoneration came 13 years too late for Stuckey, who died in prison at 31.
“I want to go home, finally,” McCallum told the New York Times. “It’s a bittersweet moment because I’m walking out alone. There’s someone else that is supposed to walk out with me but unfortunately he’s not.”
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Photo: CBS
