NEW YORK (AP) — After decades in prison, three men were cleared Friday in one of the most horrifying crimes of New York’s violent 1990s — the killing of a clerk who was set on fire in a subway toll booth. A judge dismissed the murder convictions of Vincent Ellerbe, James Irons and Thomas Malik after prosecutors said the case was built on falsehood-filled confessions, shaky witness identifications and other flawed evidence.
The three confessed to and were convicted of murdering token seller Harry Kaufman in 1995. The case resounded from New York to Washington to Hollywood, after parallels were drawn between the deadly arson and a scene in the movie “Money Train,” which had been released four days earlier.
Malik and Irons, both 45, left court free for the first time in over a quarter-century. Ellerbe, 44, was paroled in 2020.
“What happened to us can never be fixed,” Ellerbe told the court as he quietly described the ordeal of prison. “They break you, or they turn you into a monster.”
For instance, Irons said he had been able to see his supposed accomplices jump into a getaway car, although it was parked a block away and around a corner. Ellerbe described four attackers and said he had sprayed gasoline on the tollbooth exterior, when in fact it was poured in the coin slot. Malik described the car differently from how a witness did.
The same witness’ identification of Malik was also problematic, partly because she had earlier pointed to someone else — a man an informant had named separately, prosecutors said.
“More than 25 years later, we do not have any confidence in the integrity of those convictions,” assistant District Attorney Lori Glachman told the court.
At the time, Scarcella was a star Brooklyn homicide detective in a city reeling from crime. Citywide, killings topped more than 2,200 at their 1990 peak; that compares to 488 last year and a low of 295 in 2018.
But after questions accumulated about Scarcella’s tactics, the Brooklyn district attorney’s office began in 2013 to review scores of cases that he had worked.
Scarcella, who retired in 2000, has denied any wrongdoing. While more than a dozen convictions in his cases have been overturned, prosecutors have stood by scores of others.
A message seeking comment was sent Friday to an attorney who has represented him.
Brooklyn prosecutors’ reexamination of old convictions is widely viewed as one of the most ambitious of its kind.
“This is no longer about one or two bad apples. This is about a systemic rot” at a time when panic about public safety made too many police, prosecutors and judges comfortable not asking enough questions, said lawyer Ronald Kuby, who represented Ellerbe and Malik.
“People, responsible people, who really did know better … all should have done something,” he said.
Ellerbe, now a chef, is the father of a 26-year-old daughter whom he didn’t get to see grow up. Malik, still stunned that the case was finally over, said he was heading to see his mother, who recently had surgery. How to move forward? “One day at a time,” he said.
“Just keep it moving,” Ellerbe added. “You can’t look back.”
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