On June 7, 1994, a woman, identified as A.J., worked late in an office building in Manhattan, New York, then took the Number 7 train to her home in Jackson Heights, Queens. When she arrived at 69th Street and Roosevelt Avenue, she was attacked by a man holding a knife as she climbed into her parked car. The man forced her to the passenger seat, climbed in and shut the door. He demanded her jewelry and money, then forced her to disrobe and sexually assaulted her, before fleeding.
A.J. told police that her attacker was bald and wearing work boots.
Thirty-four-year-old Lee Long, who was bald and wearing work boots, was stopped by police shortly before midnight as he was walking home from the train station at 74th Street and Roosevelt Avenue in Queens. He had just stopped at a bodego and purchased a pint of Haagen Daz strawberry ice cream.
Long was taken to the victim, who viewed him from the back of an ambulance preparing to take her to a hospital. She refused to look at his face, but identified him by the work boots and the top of his head. She told the police that the shirt Long was wearing was not the shirt that her assailant wore. The police assured her that the attacker probably was wearing two shirts and removed the one he was wearing during the attack. She asked if they had recovered her jewelry. The officers told her that they had not, but that criminals frequently work in pairs and that Long had passed the stolen jewelry and money to an accomplice.
"You know I didn't do this," Long told the police. He said that at the time of the rape, he had been at his girlfriend's residence having dinner to celebrate his 34th birthday. A police officer telephoned his girlfriend immediately after Long''s arrest. She confirmed this alibi. But the police failed to reveal this to the defense.
Long's girlfriend, Yvette McCormick, testified that he was with her for dinner and left at about 11 p.m., which was the time of the crime. She was allowed to testify that she received a call from a police officer about 1:45 a.m, but was not allowed to discuss the content of the conversation.
During closing arguments, the prosecution contended that she was fudging the time to protect her boyfriend.
On April 13, 1995, a jury convicted Long of rape and robbery. He was sentenced to eight to 24 years in prison.
In 1997, the New York Supreme Court Appellate Divison, Second Department, affirmed his convition.
Years later, an investigation by the Queen's County Legal Aid Society and the Queens County District Attorney's Office discovered that the police had failed to disclose that McCormick had confirmed Long's alibi immediately after his arrest.
The prosecution commissioned police Lieutenant Stanley Carpenter to reinvestigate the case. Carpenter discovered that officer Greg Locker, the arresting officer in the case, had called McCormick after Long said he was with her. Without disclosing that Long had been arrested, Locker asked if she had seen him that evening. She confirmed that they had dinner together and left about 11 p.m.—the time of the crime. Carpenter discovered that Locker never wrote a report about the call. He had told his partner, but revealed the information to no one else. When he had testified at Long's trial about the arrest, he had not mentioned the call.
Based on the reinvestigation, Long's attorneys at the New York Legal Aid Society and the Queens County District Attorney's Office filed a motion to vacate the conviction and dismiss the indictment based on the newly discovered evidence.
On June 26, 2000, the motion was granted and Long was released.
Long retained the law firm of Cochran, Scheck & Neufeld to file a claim with the New York Court of Claims. That law suit, however, was dismissed for procedural reasons. Long subsequently sued the law firm for malpractice and the case was settled for $900,000. Long also settled a separate lawsuit against the city of New York for $50,000.
- Maurice Possley
Posting Date: 08-29-2011
