Gary Lawrence, formerly of Hempstead, found not guilty of murder in 1990 killing of Hofstra assistant coach

A Nassau County jury deliberated for less than 90 minutes Wednesday before finding a former Hempstead man, who spent decades in prison for the 1990 fatal shooting death of Hofstra assistant football coach Joseph Healy, not guilty of second-degree murder and first-degree attempted robbery.

Nassau prosecutors retried Gary Lawrence, 56, who now lives in Georgia, even after a judge set aside his and a co-defendant's conviction in 2023 after determining that prosecutors and police withheld hundreds of pages of evidence and forced a confession.

"I'm just relieved that justice has been served and the truth has come out after all these years," Lawrence said Wednesday after the jury returned its verdict. "That's all I wanted."

He was the second defendant to be retried and acquitted of murder in the decades-long case.

As the verdict was read aloud in court, Charlene Lawrence, the defendant's wife, screamed "hallelujah" while Gary Lawrence hugged his attorney, Ron Kuby.

"In 42 years [of practicing law], I've never had a jury come back this quickly," Kuby said outside of Nassau County Court in Mineola, adding that race played a role in his client's original arrest.

All of the defendants in the case are Black while the police officers and witnesses were white, he said.

Charlene Lawrence thanked "God for vindicating my husband because this has been on him for so long. He did the time but he didn't do the crime."

Nicole Turso, a spokeswoman for Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly, said "we respect the jury’s decision."

The district attorney decided to retry the case despite the fact that Lawrence has already served his full sentence and would not go back to prison if convicted a second time.

Healy, 25, of New Jersey, was out barhopping with friends on Sept. 29, 1990 when two men with guns tried to rob him and his friends by an Arby’s drive-through window about 4 a.m.

A witness testified that one of the muggers told the other, "Just do him" and shot Healy, who died that night, in the chest. 

Months after the killing, police fingered Lawrence, Christopher Ellis and David Liles. 

Lawrence signed a six-page confession blaming Liles for the shooting and saying the gun went off after Healy tried to grab it.

Defense attorneys said Lawrence was 20 years old at the time, had been held for 19 hours without food and was coerced into the confession.

In 1992, the three men were convicted of second-degree murder, two counts of first-degree attempted robbery, two counts of third-degree criminal possession of a weapon, and third-degree criminal possession of stolen property.

Lawrence served 24½ of a 25 years-to-life sentence before being released in 2015.

In 2019, after prosecutors with the Conviction Integrity Unit reviewed the case file — based on a motion filed by Ellis — they found that 50 pages of notes from lead homicide Det. Richard Wells had not been turned over to the defense.

Ellis served 31½ years in prison and was due to be paroled when both his and Lawrence's conviction were vacated.

Ellis was found not guilty at his retrial last year and he subsequently filed a federal lawsuit against Nassau, charging that county police used "unconstitutional investigative techniques," such as withholding and fabricating evidence, coercing witnesses and confessions and suppressing evidence.

Kuby said Wednesday that no decision had been made on filing a similar civil case on Lawrence's behalf against the county.

Investigators developed at least 11 leads in the case, but they were never shared with Lawrence’s lawyers, according to a 2023 ruling by state Supreme Court Justice Howard Sturim, which cleared Lawrence’s conviction.

During closing arguments Wednesday, Kuby said his client was not involved in the murder and that detectives "cooked up and manufactured" his confession. 

But Assistant District Attorney Daryl Levy disagreed, noting that while some tactics used by detectives "should not have been done," the evidence showed that Lawrence, Ellis and Liles were all responsible for Healy's killing.

In his summation, Levy said police, during their original interrogation, repeatedly informed Lawrence of his rights to remain silent and to have an attorney present before his confession.

During the week-and-half long trial, prosecutors called four witnesses, each of whom who had testified at the original trial, along with two detectives involved in the original investigation.

Lawrence's attorneys said three out of four eyewitnesses did not pick him out of a lineup and the fourth had four or five drinks the night of the shooting.

During the retrial, Kuby introduced written testimony from Lawrence's mother, who said her son was home with her at the time of the murder, while also calling an expert in false confessions.

The jury, meanwhile, was not informed about Lawrence's first conviction, the time he spent in prison, his conviction being vacated or Ellis' subsequent not guilty verdict during his retrial.

Liles did not file paperwork seeking to overturn his conviction. State records show he was released on parole in 2021.

By Robert Brodsky

robert.brodsky@newsday.com@BrodskyRobert

Robert Brodsky is a breaking news reporter who has worked at Newsday since 2011. He is a Queens College and American University alum.