After 44 years, Keith Bush’s 1976 murder conviction was vacated by a judge after a district attorney’s report concluded he had been wrongfully convicted of the sex-related murder of teenager Sherese Watson. 

The judge's decision followed a special Newsday report about the case, 
<a href="https://projects.newsday.com/long-island/suffolk-police-innocence-project/">"An Innocent Man?"</a> 

Here is the latest follow-up coverage about the vacated conviction and efforts to investigate the handling of the case.

Long Island

Keith Bush was a 17-year-old junior at Bellport High School when Suffolk authorities charged him with killing Sherese Watson, 14, after a late-night house party in North Bellport. For the past 44 years, Keith Bush has claimed he was an innocent man, ever since he was accused and convicted of the 1975 Suffolk County sex-related murder. 


Investigations

Newsday Investigation: Proving Innocence: The Story of Keith Bush

Proving Innocence: The Story of Keith Bush

Newsday

liBUSH191231_video

Thomas Maier

The price tag for alleged wrongdoing by Suffolk law-enforcement — including the conviction of Keith Bush for a murder he didn’t commit — could exceed an estimated $50 million and place even more burden on the county’s stressed finances, according to government officials and an analysis of court records. 
But while Suffolk taxpayers continue to fund&nbsp;millions of&nbsp;dollars in damages for past wrongdoing — what County Executive Steve Bellone has called “the corruption tax” — critics say county officials are doing little to examine or remedy the systemic problems that caused the&nbsp;lawsuits in the first place. 
According to records and officials, individuals or their families who have won settlements or filed litigation against Suffolk include: 
<ul> 
 <li>Bush, who has started litigation that experts say could result in a $30 million payment for a wrongful murder conviction that sent him to prison for 33 years.</li> 
 <li>Martin Tankleff, who was awarded $13 million in federal and state payouts in April 2018. Tankleff&nbsp;spent 17 years in prison before his 1990 murder conviction was thrown out.</li> 
 <li>Shawn Lawrence, who in May&nbsp;filed state and federal lawsuits seeking more than $20 million against Suffolk after spending six years in prison for a murder conviction later vacated because of police and prosecutorial misconduct. Lawrence's is one of a handful of homicide and major felony cases since 2017 that fell apart after prosecutors were forced to resign because of improper actions.</li> 
 <li>A&nbsp;Lindenhurst man&nbsp;who died while in the custody of police who allegedly used&nbsp;excessive force. His family received a payout of $2.25 million in 2014.</li> 
 <li>Chirstopher Loeb, who received $1.5 million after he was beaten in 2012 while in custody&nbsp;by former Suffolk Police Chief James Burke.</li> 
</ul> 
Perhaps the biggest potential liability for Suffolk involves Bush. 
A Newsday investigation, published shortly before Bush’s May 22 exoneration by a judge, revealed wrongdoing not only by police and prosecutors but also questionable handling of forensic evidence by Suffolk authorities, who destroyed the alleged murder weapon. 
In the wake of the Bush findings, Suffolk’s Conviction Integrity Bureau, created by District Attorney Tim Sini, is examining more than 100 claims of innocence in previous convictions, including at least one murder conviction from the 1990s. Though the total bill for damages&nbsp;is far from certain, legal experts say payouts for such wrongful convictions generally tend to cost $1 million for every year improperly spent behind bars. 
&nbsp;“I think it’s a fact that when you have cases like Keith Bush’s, there is going to be litigation and people will sue the county,” Sini told Newsday. 
The looming cost for law enforcement wrongdoing in Suffolk comes at a time when county officials say they can ill afford it. 
Suffolk had an operating deficit of about $26.5 million in 2018 and a general fund balance deficit of $285 million, according to a report last month&nbsp;by State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli.&nbsp;The county has amassed $883 million in debt over the past decade, the County Legislature's budget review office said in 2018, and has had its bond rating downgraded several times. 
&nbsp;“Are we able to keep on adding these continual judgments? Absolutely not,” said Suffolk Comptroller John Kennedy. 
Kennedy, a Republican,&nbsp;said Suffolk has to issue bonds for these payouts, each approved by the County Legislature. 
“When these judgments roll along, we have to forgo the opportunity to invest in the brick and mortar of actual government” such as&nbsp;parks improvements and upkeep with aging county buildings, Kennedy said. “We, in essence, put them on the credit card.” 
Suffolk has the highest “fiscal stress” level of any county in New York State,&nbsp;according to DiNapoli's review of 2018 municipal finances. 
&nbsp;"For municipalities in significant fiscal stress, including Suffolk County, they often don't have money to fall back on if something unexpected arises," said Elliott Auerbach, deputy state&nbsp;comptroller.&nbsp;Suffolk’s high-stress ranking shows “a limited ability to cover revenue shortfalls, cost overruns,&nbsp;unexpected legal costs&nbsp;or something unplanned," he said. 
Bellone declined to be interviewed for this story. But last month, when reelected to a new term as county executive, Bellone acknowledged the mounting debt that the county faces from wrongful convictions such as&nbsp;the Bush case and from a “culture of corruption” that festered under former DA Tom Spota. In November 2017, Spota resigned amid federal charges that he covered up the beating by Burke of Loeb. Earlier this month, Spota and his former anti-corruption unit chief, Christopher McPartland, were both convicted of those charges and now await sentencing. 
"There is a corruption tax that is associated with this kind of conduct," Bellone told Newsday last month. "It's unfortunate. It's terrible. And if you want to prevent it in the future it's important that the truth come out.” 
Critics say taxpayers face this added burden because Suffolk doesn’t provide enough oversight and systemic review of the root causes behind official wrongdoing resulting in multimillion-dollar settlements.&nbsp;“It’s insane that the county isn’t looking at the procedures that caused the taxpayers to pay all this money — unfortunately that is never done,” said Julia Kuan, Lawrence’s attorney. In Kuan’s lawsuit, she cites evidence of Suffolk official misconduct, including allegations of “withheld or destroyed evidence, suborned perjury and false arguments to judges and juries in order to obtain unconstitutional convictions.” 
Kuan said the lack of proper oversight by top Suffolk authorities is largely to blame for these problems. “Spota ran the Suffolk County DA’s Office more like a criminal enterprise than a district attorney’s office,” she asserts in her lawsuit for Lawrence. 
County officials say legislative approval of payouts resulting from lawsuits from police and prosecutorial misdeeds are usually done in private as a personnel matter, rather than the focus of a public hearing. Suffolk Legis. Tom Donnelly, who chairs the Public Safety Committee, said that&nbsp;his panel’s “oversight is limited” over police and that prosecutorial actions are reviewed by the DA’s office, which is separately elected. 
Some steps at reform are being planned. After&nbsp;Bush’s exoneration in May, Sini — who has taken many measures to distance himself from Spota and other previous wrongdoing by Suffolk authorities — gained nearly $850,000 in federal grants to study wrongful conviction cases to pinpoint system problems in the way police and prosecutors handle serious felony crimes. 
Though taxpayers may cringe at lottery-sized payouts, supporters of Suffolk’s CIB and other criminal justice review units elsewhere around the state say civil damage lawsuits are an appropriate way to recognize the human suffering caused those victimized by official wrongdoing. 
“The fact that people are compensated for the time they were imprisoned should not be used as a weapon to try and diminish these Conviction Integrity units,” said&nbsp;former judge Barry Kamins, co-chair of the New York State Bar Association’s Task Force on Wrongful Convictions. “To say we don’t have much money for wrongful convictions is an ‘Alice in Wonderland’ argument.” 
Bush and his attorney Adele Bernhard declined to comment about their pending lawsuit against Suffolk. But Tankleff said the total $13 million settlement to him — to be paid through a bond approved by the Suffolk Legislature — seems like little compensation for the prime years of his young adulthood that he lost unfairly imprisoned. 
&nbsp;“Everyone exonerated that I ever have met said, ‘I would have rather had my freedom than money’,” Tankleff explained. “Nobody would give up their freedom for money.” 
With Rachelle Blidner

Suffolk

poBUSH191222

Suffolk facing huge price tag for alleged law enforcement wrongdoing

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s office is going to review the Keith Bush murder case — one of the longest-running “innocent man” prosecutions in U.S. history — citing concerns about possible prosecutorial misconduct, a spokesman said. 
A yearlong Newsday investigation last May revealed evidence of alleged wrongdoing by Suffolk police and prosecutors in the 1976 conviction of Bush, who was convicted of killing 14-year-old Bellport High School student Sherese Watson. Shortly after, Bush was exonerated by a Suffolk judge and is now, at age 62, suing the county for wrongful prosecution. 
“As the Governor has previously said — no one is above the law and any allegations of misconduct by prosecutors need to be taken seriously,” Jason Conwall, a Cuomo spokesman,&nbsp;said about the Bush case. “We will be reviewing the matter.” 
Cuomo’s comments were in response to Newsday’s inquiry about the case and his newly created Commission on Prosecutorial Conduct, which is currently stalled because of a lawsuit challenging its validity by the state’s District Attorneys Association. 
Bush, who has called for an independent prosecutor to investigate alleged wrongdoing in the handling of his case, said he was pleased by Cuomo’s interest and wants the commission to review it. 
“I think it’s very good that he’s doing that — they can investigate a number of prosecutors who handled my case over the years,” Bush said. “It shows they are serious about holding people accountable and I’m very appreciative.” 
During the 44-year timeline of Bush’s case, several Suffolk prosecutors — including former District Attorney Tom Spota — had access to incriminating information about another suspect, John W. Jones Jr., but it was never disclosed publicly until recently. Shortly after Bush’s arrest in 1975, Jones admitted to tripping over the dead girl at the murder scene. Jones&nbsp;died in 2006. 
However, this exculpatory information about Jones was never disclosed by Suffolk authorities at Bush’s trial nor during subsequent appeals and hearings about Bush’s case until his attorney, Adele Bernhard, learned about Jones in 2017 and 2018 through state Freedom of Information Law requests. Bush was exonerated May 22 after a lengthy investigation by Spota’s successor, District Attorney Timothy Sini, and his newly created Conviction Integrity Bureau, headed by Howard Master. 
Spota, who opposed Bush’s efforts to clear his name a decade ago, said he doesn’t remember the Bush case. Other prosecutors who handled the Bush case have declined comment. Gerard Sullivan, Bush’s 1976 trial prosecutor who later became Spota’s law partner in private practice, died in 1993. 
However, any independent review of the Bush case by the governor still faces hurdles. Because of&nbsp;the legal challenge by the state&nbsp;DA&nbsp;group, Cuomo hasn’t yet named members to his commission. “The Commission on Prosecutorial Conduct is a matter of court litigation and hasn’t been formed because of it,” Conwall said. If it gets off the ground, supporters say the commission will have wide powers to investigate unethical behavior by prosecutors. 
In the lawsuit filed in state Supreme Court in Albany against Cuomo’s commission, the state DA Association contends that it&nbsp;is an unconstitutional overreach and that local district attorneys&nbsp;are best able to investigate and punish wrongdoing by prosecutors in their own offices. Among those supporting Cuomo’s commission, according to a legal brief, is the New York Law School Post Conviction Innocence Clinic, headed by Bernhard, Bush’s attorney. That legal brief, joined by other criminal justice advocates, cites the Bush case as one of many reasons in support of a&nbsp;commission. 
Sini, who is part of the state DA group opposing the Cuomo commission, declined comment. His Convictions Integrity Bureau is&nbsp;reviewing dozens of other claims of innocence in past Suffolk convictions.

poBUSH191129

Gov. Cuomo's office to review Keith Bush murder case

Gov. Cuomo's office to review Keith Bush case

poBUSH191129_photos

Keith Bush, recently exonerated in the 1975 murder of a North Bellport teenager, has filed a damages&nbsp;lawsuit against Suffolk County for false arrest, malicious prosecution and other alleged wrongdoing by law-enforcement authorities that resulted in him&nbsp;spending 33 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. 
No dollar amount was requested, but experts have said Bush could eventually receive $30 million or more in compensation. 
In&nbsp;May, a Suffolk judge dropped all charges against Bush, 62, in one of the longest-running “innocent man” cases in U.S. history. In the wake of the Bush case, Suffolk’s Conviction Integrity Bureau is reviewing more than 100 other claims of innocence in previous Suffolk convictions. 
“Keith Bush sustained severe mental and emotional injuries and anguish” from his decadeslong imprisonment, even though Bush was “actually innocent of the crimes with which he was convicted,” according to Bush’s&nbsp;lawsuit filed with the state Court of Claims. Without mentioning a specific dollar amount, Bush’s legal action seeks to “recover substantial damages for this frightening and horrendous injustice.” 
The Suffolk District Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Bureau recommended Bush’s exoneration on May 22 after his attorney, Adele Bernhard, argued&nbsp;that the prosecutor and police at Bush’s 1976 trial conspired to hide evidence of another suspect, John W. Jones Jr., in the murder&nbsp;of 14-year-old Bellport High school student&nbsp;Sherese Watson. “Inexcusably, for 40 years, Suffolk County law enforcement hid compelling evidence pointing to the likely perpetrator,” the lawsuit alleges. 
A few days before the judge exonerated Bush, a yearlong Newsday investigation revealed many allegations of wrongdoing in the case and how evidence of Bush’s innocence remained hidden or ignored for decades by Suffolk authorities. 
Both Bush and his attorney Bernhard declined to comment on the state lawsuit, which seeks unspecified damages to be determined under the Unjust Conviction and Imprisonment Act of 1984. A spokesman for the Suffolk police also declined to comment on the pending litigation. 
Current Suffolk District Attorney&nbsp;Timothy Sini and County&nbsp;Executive Steve Bellone have criticized past practices by Suffolk law enforcement that have been deemed improper or unlawful. On election night earlier this month, Bellone warned that damages lawsuits resulting from Suffolk’s “culture of corruption” in the past, including the Bush case, could cost taxpayers many dollars in the future. 
According to the lawsuit, the alleged wrongdoing by Suffolk law-enforcement authorities includes: 
<ul> 
 <li>Making up testimony through force.&nbsp;Suffolk police “manufactured false evidence by coercing” the then 17-year-old Bush through “brute force and physical assault into signing a false statement the [Suffolk police] wrote for his signature — a statement that was never true and incorporated facts later proved to be false,” the lawsuit says. “Detectives provided false evidence” and “coerced witnesses” to lie. At Bush’s 1976 trial, detectives “falsely denied using force” to obtain a purported confession from Bush. In fact, during their interrogation, detectives “hit Mr. Bush, kicked him in the groin, suggested that he might die in police custody and battered his head with a large telephone-type book.” After nearly seven hours of abuse, Bush “yielded to their demands, fearing for his life and safety” and signed the false confession.</li> 
 <li>Failing to check out a key witness’ recantation.&nbsp;Maxine Bell, a key trial witness who testified she saw Bush with Watson prior to murder, later recanted at an early 1980s appeal hearing, saying that police “had forced her to implicate” Bush. But the lawsuit says the Suffolk DA’s office at that time “did not investigate her {Bell’s] claims of coercion” allowing the conviction to be affirmed and keeping Bush in jail for many more years.</li> 
 <li>Forensic experts misled the jury.&nbsp;A member of the Suffolk Medical Examiner’s office “testified that an afro pick comb that [Suffolk police] removed from members of Mr. Bush’s family had caused injuries to the victim’s back — thus connecting Mr. Bush to the&nbsp;crime,” the lawsuit says. “However, that testimony was false and medical evidence has since established that the comb did not and could not have caused those injuries.” A similar conclusion appeared in the CIB’s report about the Bush case.</li> 
 <li>Hiding evidence about another potential suspect.&nbsp;Suffolk police and prosecutors “intentionally, recklessly and/or grossly negligently procured Mr. Bush’s conviction by manufacturing false evidence and failing to disclose exculpatory evidence” about Jones. The lawsuit says that Bush learned of Jones — who admitted to tripping over Watson’s body on the night of the January 1975 murder — only through Freedom of Information requests made to police and the Suffolk DA’s office in 2017 and 2018, respectively.</li> 
</ul> 
Much of Bush’s damages lawsuit cites the lengthy CIB report released last May about the Bush case as well as mentioning&nbsp;previous reports about wrongdoing by Suffolk homicide detectives and prosecutors that appeared in a 1986 Newsday series and a subsequent 1989 state Commission of Investigation report. In subsequent years, detectives who handled Bush’s arrest case were later “the subject of multiple investigations and discipline for coercing other similarly situated individuals to falsely confess,” the lawsuit says. 
The lawsuit&nbsp;cites evidence of racial bias against Bush, who had&nbsp;never been in trouble before with the law. “Instead of proof, investigating detectives simply fantasized about what might have happened and selected Mr. Bush to target, based on what was essentially their hunch — a hunch informed not by facts but by their biased attitude about the neighborhood they were charged with serving and protecting,” the lawsuit alleges. 
The suit also provided a glimpse of Bush’s life spent in “some of the most violent maximum-security prisons in New York”, including upstate facilities in Attica, Wende, Elmira, Auburn and Greenhaven. “Through nearly a lifetime incarcerated for a crime he did not commit, Mr. Bush was deprived of the opportunity to attend school outside the prison system, to learn a viable trade, or to marry and build a family,” the lawsuit says. “He lived in constant terror of assault. He spent many years enduring the horrible loneliness and boredom of solitary confinement where he was placed for his own protection.” 
Citing his bouts of depression and other emotional damage, the lawsuit says Bush “suffered the shame of knowing that family, friends correctional officers, as well as other inmates believed that he had raped and murdered a young girl." 
On Oct.&nbsp;29, Bush and his attorney attended an initial hearing in Hauppauge about his lawsuit in state Court of Claims, which was first filed in July shortly after his exoneration. He is expected to file a similar federal lawsuit soon.

poBUSH191117

Keith Bush sues Suffolk County over 1976 wrongful conviction

Keith Bush files lawsuit over wrongful conviction

Crime

An innocent man?

poBUSH190521_Video

The newly created state Commission on Prosecutorial Conduct won’t be examining alleged misconduct in the “innocent man” case of Keith Bush anytime soon because of legal opposition to the&nbsp;watchdog agency by a statewide group of prosecutors. 
Bush says the new state commission should investigate possible wrongdoing by several past and present Suffolk prosecutors&nbsp;who had access to Bush’s case but never disclosed evidence of another potential suspect, John W. Jones Jr. On May 22, a Suffolk judge cleared Bush of the 1975 murder of North Bellport teenager&nbsp;Sherese&nbsp;Watson, after Bush had served 33 years in state prison. 
“It is the perfect case” for the new state commission to investigate, said Bush’s attorney, Adele Bernard, who runs the New York Law School Post-Conviction Innocence Clinic. 
In May, a report by Suffolk District Attorney&nbsp;Timothy Sini’s Conviction Integrity Bureau concluded that Bush’s trial prosecutor had deliberately hid evidence about Jones. 
However, Bush’s call for an independent probe of alleged prosecutorial misconduct in his case is being effectively thwarted by the District Attorneys Association of the State of New York, of which Sini is a member. The group&nbsp;has filed a lawsuit challenging the legality of the commission, which was approved by the State Legislature and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in March. Appointments to the 11-member commission — as well as any potential probes of prosecutorial misconduct — have been put on hold while the state lawsuit filed in Albany plays out. 
“Understand that prosecutors are not against oversight,” said Morgan Bitton, the DA&nbsp;group’s executive director.&nbsp;“We are however opposed to the unconstitutional commission set up by this legislation that violates the separation of powers and interferes with prosecutorial discretion.” In its lawsuit, the association argues that oversight of prosecutors is already in place with the state’s grievance process, which&nbsp;applies to all attorneys. 
Cuomo said the new commission is necessary to root out prosecutorial misconduct, stop wrongful convictions, and avoid costly retrials and settlements at taxpayer expense. The investigative agency would have powers to admonish, censure, or recommend the termination of employment of prosecutors who have behaved unethically. Supporters say Cuomo’s new panel is similar to the state’s Commission on Judicial Conduct regulating judges. 
“You have people like Bush sitting in jail for years because of the malfeasance of a prosecutor and in those cases, they should be punished,” said State Sen. Phil Boyle (R-Bay Shore), a sponsor of the bill creating the new commission. “Most prosecutors are honest and hardworking but there’s a need for oversight — we do that with judges and we should do that here.” 
Court papers defending the new&nbsp;commission have cited the alleged wrongdoing in the Bush case and the need for oversight. “Prosecutors who engage in misconduct rarely face even the slightest admonishment,” according to a legal brief filed by Bernhard’s clinic and several others opposing the DA's group in the lawsuit. “Serious sanctions are even more uncommon. This is true despite the often devastating consequences of such misconduct.” 
For Sini, the question of whether the new state commission will investigate the Bush case is a complicated one. 
He&nbsp;has been critical of past practices by some in Suffolk law enforcement, particularly his predecessor, Thomas Spota. Spota told Newsday he doesn’t remember the Bush case and said he doesn’t ever recall Gerard Sullivan, the prosecutor in the Bush case and&nbsp;once a law partner with Spota,&nbsp;doing anything improper when they worked together. 
Spota is expected to begin a trial Nov. 12 on federal charges that he covered up a prisoner beating by former Suffolk Police Chief James Burke. In February 2016, Burke pleaded guilty and was given 46-month sentence. 
In 2017, Suffolk prosecutor Glenn Kurtzrock was forced to resign for alleged prosecutorial misconduct in several Suffolk murder cases, eventually including that of Shawn Lawrence, who was freed after six years in prison. 
Last month, reacting to problems found in the Bush case, Bernard and Sini’s office received two federal grants totaling $850,000 to work together in reviewing more than 100 other claims of innocence in past Suffolk convictions and recommend any systemic changes in the county’s law-enforcement system. 
However, Sini has supported the statewide DAs group in opposing the new state commission on constitutional grounds. Sini declined to be interviewed for this story. But his office has said privately that an independent probe of the Bush case isn’t necessary. They expressed confidence that the CIB’s lengthy review was thorough but didn’t yield enough legal evidence to charge any police or prosecutors with wrongdoing. 
Sullivan —&nbsp;a&nbsp;key player in the Bush drama — died in 1993. The CIB determined that Sullivan knew about a written statement that Jones,&nbsp;the other potential suspect&nbsp;in the Watson murder, gave to Suffolk homicide detectives, placing himself at the murder scene at the time of the teenage girl’s killing. But Sullivan never revealed that evidence at Bush’s 1976 trial in violation of legal rules. 
In addition to Sullivan, a Newsday investigation found several Suffolk prosecutors had access to Bush’s file over the past four decades — including two who are now judges and a third who remains employed in Sini’s office — though no evidence has been disclosed publicly that they knew about Jones’ existence. All have declined to be interviewed. 
Though grateful to Sini’s CIB probe that led to his exoneration, Bush remains frustrated that no Suffolk official so far has been punished for alleged improprieties in his long-running case. “I don’t think all the questions will be answered in my case unless there is an independent reviewer like this commission,” said Bush. “If the president can be impeached, why are prosecutors above the law? I lost 44 years of my life because they tried to hide the truth.”

poBUSH191103

Lawsuit stalls panel designed to probe prosecutorial misconduct

Lawsuit stalls panel set up to probe prosecutorial misconduct

Reacting to the exoneration of Keith Bush, wrongly convicted of murder&nbsp;in one of the longest “innocent man” cases in U.S. history, Suffolk law enforcement officials have obtained two federal grants totaling nearly $850,000&nbsp;to investigate other claims of innocence, rectify wrongful convictions, and study ways to avoid systemic problems exposed in the Bush case. 
“I think it’s great and highlights that we want to become a national model,” said Suffolk District Attorney Timothy Sini about the two U.S. Department of Justice grants for his Conviction Integrity Bureau, part of the reforms that Sini promised following the&nbsp;Bush exoneration. 
On May 22, Bush’s conviction in the killing of a North Bellport teenager was thrown out by a Suffolk judge after 44 years of trying to prove his innocence. A probe by Sini’s CIB determined that key evidence had been deliberately suppressed by the prosecutor and police in Bush’s 1976 trial — including the identity of another potential suspect. Bush, now 62, spent 33 years behind bars for the crime.&nbsp; 
The CIB is reviewing more than 100 cases of previously convicted criminals — including defendants in two old murder cases that&nbsp;are being actively reinvestigated, according to Assistant DA Howard Master, who oversees the CIB. Police Commissioner Geraldine Hart has pledged her support for the CIB’s effort. 
With the new federal funding, Master said, the CIB’s review of these cases will be conducted in a rare “collaborative” arrangement with New York Law School’s Post-Conviction Innocence Clinic headed by adjunct professor Adele Bernhard, who championed Bush’s successful&nbsp;bid&nbsp;to overturn his conviction. Bernhard and her team of law students are expected to help screen cases where some past injustice may have occurred. 
Master said this “partnership” between a prosecutor’s office and an outside law school is&nbsp;being done in only a handful of jurisdictions around the country. 
“They [the New York Law School team] will bring a different perspective, and Adele has written and studied in this area,” explained Master.&nbsp; 
The Justice Department grants were&nbsp;made public last week at a Suffolk County Legislature hearing, which approved the hiring of a DNA lab in Virginia to conduct forensic analysis for the CIB starting in November. That DNA testing will be funded with a $574,000 federal grant, which will also pay for other forensic testing and investigators’ salaries. 
Another $275,000 federal grant will help pay for the CIB’s partnership with Bernhard and the New York Law School clinic. Both grants are for a two-year period. 
“The CIB aims to achieve and ensure justice by investigating claims of innocence,” Sini’s office said in seeking the county’s approval to hire an outside DNA lab, Bode Cellmark Forensics Inc. Master said the outside testing will help avoid extra work for the Suffolk crime lab handling current criminal investigations. 
Master said each of the 100 previous convictions will be examined individually, some reaching back more than 20 years. But he added that the CIB will address any systemic problems, similar to those that arose in the Bush case. They include: 
<ul> 
 <li>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Questionable statements to police by defendants and witnesses that may be contradicted by physical evidence or the existence of other suspects.</li> 
 <li>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Faulty handling of DNA and destruction of other vital evidence, such as an alleged murder weapon.&nbsp;</li> 
 <li>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;A&nbsp;thorough review of existing police and DA files to make sure that any exculpatory evidence pointing to a defendant’s innocence was not ignored or mishandled by authorities.&nbsp;</li> 
</ul> 
“It makes us damn sure that we’ve looked at everything in a case and that nothing is overlooked or — God forbid — withheld,” Master said. He was&nbsp;referring to the lessons his CIB team of prosecutors and detectives learned from their Bush investigation. It was the first major probe by the agency created by Sini last year. 
A nine-month Newsday investigation, published prior to Bush’s exoneration, revealed many flaws in his case and raised the question whether Bush was an innocent man who had spent much of his life in prison based on faulty evidence — findings later confirmed in the CIB report approved by Suffolk County Judge Anthony Senft Jr.&nbsp;“I cannot give you that which was taken from you in the 1970s,” the judge told Bush last May, “but what I can restore to you today is your presumption of innocence.” 
Since becoming district attorney in early 2018, Sini has been critical of past practices by Suffolk law enforcement, especially his predecessor, Thomas Spota, who is facing trial on federal corruption charges. In a previous Newsday interview, Sini said “there was a culture that unfortunately infected certain parts of the Suffolk County criminal justice system” that he remains determined to change. 
In their 93-page report recommending Bush’s exoneration, CIB investigators detailed how former Suffolk detectives obtained a false confession from Bush, which he says was beaten out of him. The report also explained how Gerard Sullivan, the prosecutor in Bush’s 1976 trial, failed to disclose important evidence about another potential suspect, John W. Jones. Jr. 
Newly revealed documents obtained by Bush’s defense showed that Jones admitted to tripping over the body of Sherese Watson, a 14-year-old high school student, found in a nearby empty lot after a late-night January 1975 teenage party in North Bellport. These incriminating documents about Jones — who&nbsp;died in 2006 — remained unknown publicly until Bernhard filed a Freedom of Information lawsuit against Suffolk County. 
Bush has called for a special prosecutor to review his case and identify all police and prosecutors who had access to his files and may have acted improperly during the four decades of legal wrangling over his case. 
“If they had the CIB back then, they would have come to the same conclusion as they did now,” Bush said. “But the DA’s office back then normally opposed everything and never looked at this case sincerely.” 
Now a free man, Bush will talk about his experience Tuesday at 6 p.m. at a Hofstra Law School forum.

poBUSH191018

Suffolk DA to use federal grants to probe claims of innocence 

Suffolk DA to probe claims of innocence

poBUSH190811

Keith Bush, recently exonerated&nbsp;in one of the longest-running “innocent man” murder cases in U.S. history, is now calling for an independent investigation to determine&nbsp;who&nbsp;in Suffolk County law-enforcement may have known about the other possible suspect in the January 1975 murder of North Bellport teenager Sherese Watson. 
Over the past four decades, various Suffolk police and prosecutors had access to Bush’s homicide files containing incriminating documents about the other potential suspect, John W. Jones Jr. Yet this evidence remained unknown publicly until disclosed in May. 
“It’s amazing that this case fell into so many hands over the years and no one said anything about John Jones,” said Bush, 62, recalling fateful turning points since his arrest 44 years ago. 
On May 22, a Suffolk judge&nbsp;cleared&nbsp;Bush’s name after&nbsp;District Attorney Timothy&nbsp;Sini’s Conviction Integrity Bureau determined that the lead prosecutor in Bush’s 1976 trial, Gerard Sullivan, who died in 1993, deliberately hid evidence about&nbsp;Jones. This suppression of evidence included&nbsp;a signed police statement in which Jones admitted tripping over&nbsp;Watson’s body at the murder scene, leaving behind his black plastic comb, as well as a follow-up lie detector report.&nbsp;After examining all the available evidence, including the Jones documents, the CIB determined that Bush was “actually innocent” of Watson’s murder. 
But because his case involves some Suffolk legal officials still active and on the scene, Bush is calling for the independent review of his case — outside the purview of the district attorney’s office — to investigate allegations that others, including former District Attorney Thomas Spota, may have acted improperly. 
“I think the cover-up is deeper than just (former prosecutor Gerard] Sullivan, and that others looked the other way over the years,” Bush said. “They apologize for the foul play in this case, but there was nothing about holding people accountable for their actions. If there’s no accountability here, it sends a terrible message.” 
Some legal ethics experts agree with Bush that an outside investigator is needed — partly because Sini’s office faces too many possible ethical conflicts, but also&nbsp;because Sini must interact everyday with Suffolk police and judges. 
“It seems to me the safer course is to have an outside inspection, simply because of potential conflicts of interest and concerns about the integrity in general,” said&nbsp;Columbia Law School professor Bernard Harcourt. “Working with the police, they [the district attorney’s office] have&nbsp;a vested interest in a good relationship.” Harcourt said an independent review could be done at the direction of the state attorney general or a top judge. 
However, Sini expressed confidence in his CIB, its own three-person review panel, and its ability for “continuous dialogue” with legal experts and those who allege&nbsp;they were wrongfully convicted. 
“From the moment we created the Conviction Integrity Bureau, the goal was to collaborate with stakeholders and outside independent experts, which is why we created the Independent Review Panel, made up of experts in ethics and defense advocacy, to review our findings in each case and make recommendations on how to proceed,” Sini said in a statement. 
The&nbsp;evidence about Jones, gathered in the 1970s&nbsp;by Suffolk homicide detectives,&nbsp;remained undisclosed for decades, despite several court hearings since then in which Bush claimed his innocence. It&nbsp;came to light only&nbsp;after Bush’s current lawyer filed a Freedom of Information&nbsp;lawsuit&nbsp;for his complete criminal file. The resulting CIB investigation recommended that Bush’s conviction&nbsp;for murder and attempted sex abuse&nbsp;be thrown out in part because Sullivan&nbsp;failed to&nbsp;disclose&nbsp;evidence about Jones at the 1976 trial as required legally. 
Although Jones had been questioned by police before Bush’s 1976 trial, neither&nbsp;Bush’s trial judge, the jury nor Bush’s defense lawyer ever found out about Jones' existence. 
Instead, in 1976,&nbsp;Bush&nbsp;was convicted, went to&nbsp;prison&nbsp;for 33 years, and spent&nbsp;another decade on parole as a convicted sex-offender. 
Just who knew about Jones’ existence in Suffolk homicide&nbsp;files&nbsp;remains of concern to&nbsp;the CIB investigators&nbsp;as well as Bush. An initial&nbsp;draft of the Bush exoneration report said “the CIB continues to investigate who knew what and when concerning the existence of Jones’s statement” until that line was removed&nbsp;because of caution about the ongoing probe. 
A Newsday review of court documents shows several&nbsp;Suffolk&nbsp;officials were involved at various points during the 44-year history of the Bush case, though it remains unclear how much they may have known about Jones, if anything.&nbsp;The list of past and present officials with access to Bush’s file&nbsp;include: 
<ul> 
 <li>Former Suffolk District Attorney Thomas Spota.&nbsp;In the mid-2000s, Spota’s office resisted attempts by Bush’s lawyer to exonerate him, calling it a “fishing expedition.”&nbsp;Spota, a former friend and law partner of Sullivan, recently told Newsday he didn’t recall anything about the Bush case. In an interview with CIB investigators, a retired Suffolk homicide detective suggested Spota knew about the case. “Why is this thing being opened again, I thought Tommy Spota took care of this?” said the detective, August Stahl, who helped put together Bush’s alleged 1975 confession, according to the CIB report. Currently Spota faces federal corruption charges of covering up wrongdoing by former Suffolk Chief of Police James Burke. Bush said&nbsp;Spota’s role in his murder conviction review should be investigated.&nbsp;Though Spota talked with Newsday, the CIB did not interview the former district attorney about the Bush case. Federal officials declined to comment.</li> 
 <li>Two current judges who previously served as Suffolk assistant district attorneys — Suffolk County Judge Paul Hensley and Suffolk County Supreme Court Justice John B. Collins.&nbsp;As a Suffolk ADA in&nbsp;1989, Hensley approved a Freedom of Information Law request from Bush for his criminal file.&nbsp;Bush said&nbsp;Hensley’s response&nbsp;should have included documents about Jones&nbsp;at the Watson murder scene, but there was no such mention. Hensley, who was disciplined in 2012 by state judicial authorities for&nbsp;“reckless behavior” in a separate gambling incident,&nbsp;declined to be interviewed for this story. In a separate&nbsp;2005 exchange, Collins was a top&nbsp;S­uffolk&nbsp;prosecutor&nbsp;who responded to Bush’s request for DNA testing on the black plastic comb found at the murder scene, which was later linked to Jones. Crime lab testing showed that DNA found on Watson’s&nbsp;body was not from Bush but instead from another unidentified male.&nbsp;In these two separate attempts by Bush to prove his innocence, no documents about Jones were disclosed.&nbsp;Collins declined to comment because of his current role as a judge.</li> 
 <li>Suffolk police involved in the Bush case.&nbsp;Former Det. Dennis Rafferty, who oversaw Bush’s 1975 confession, acknowledged to the CIB through his attorney that he took Jones’ 1975 incriminating statement and accompanied Jones for a&nbsp;lie-detector test. According to the CIB report, Rafferty said Sullivan, Stahl and “and others” in the Suffolk police and District Attorney’s office “were aware of the existence of Jones in 1975.” When interviewed by the CIB, Stahl showed “racial animus” toward Bush, calling him a racial epithet, and denied knowing anything about the other suspect Jones, the&nbsp;report said. However, when interviewed by Newsday, Stahl acknowledged knowing about Jones but said he didn’t consider him a serious suspect at the time. Rafferty declined to be interviewed for this story.</li> 
 <li>Suffolk prosecutors, past and present, with access to the Bush files.&nbsp;At an early 1980s hearing, when a key witness recanted and said she lied at Bush’s 1976 trial, nothing came up about Jones. Bush said the recantation should have prompted a complete review of his case file, which presumably would have revealed the Jones documents. However, the hearing’s prosecutor, William Keahon, now in private practice, said&nbsp;the CIB report&nbsp;shows nothing improper was done at that hearing, which was focused primarily on the legal “probable cause” issue involving Bush’s alleged police confession, and that he could not remember anything else from the nearly 40-year-old hearing. During the mid-2000s, prosecutor Rosalind C. Gray, a current member of the district attorney’s office, handled repeated efforts by Bush to test DNA from the murder scene, including from the black plastic comb linked to Jones, yet none of the documents about Jones&nbsp;was disclosed in court. Retired State Supreme Court Justice Martin I. Efman, who presided over those DNA hearings, said he was “surprised” that the Jones documents in Bush’s file were never revealed. “I don’t know how it could&nbsp;not&nbsp;have been found,” Efman told Newsday. Gray was unavailable for comment, according to a DA spokesman.</li> 
</ul> 
In reaction to Bush’s exoneration, Sini’s office along with the New York Law School legal clinic that championed Bush’s case recently filed for a U.S. Justice Department grant to study Suffolk’s methods of handling homicide and other felonies in an effort to avoid similar wrongful convictions.&nbsp; 
“Our relentless pursuit of creating a national model has led us to further collaborate and partner with the New York Law School’s Post-Conviction Innocence Clinic in applying for a grant that would allow them to assist us in the review and investigation of our Conviction Integrity Bureau cases.” Sini said. “We will continue to collaborate with stakeholders and implement best practices to make the Suffolk County Conviction Integrity Bureau a national model.” 
But even those who praise Sini’s role in the exoneration of Bush nevertheless say Suffolk’s long history of law-enforcement problems demands an outside probe of possible official wrongdoing in the way Bush’s case was handled. 
“This [Bush] case is a perfect storm of things that could go wrong,” said&nbsp;Hofstra University law professor Ellen Yaroshefsky, who heads its legal ethics institute. “If you want to restore public trust, it’s essential to have some sort of independent review.”

Man exonerated in murder seeks independent probe

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The Suffolk district attorney and the New York Law School legal clinic that championed the recent exoneration of convicted murderer Keith Bush are seeking a federal grant for a far-ranging study of Suffolk’s methods in handling murder cases and other felonies as part of an effort to avoid wrongful convictions. 
Reacting to problems exposed in one of the longest-running “innocent man” cases in U.S. history, DA Timothy Sini applied for research money under a U.S. Justice Department program designed to review post-conviction claims of innocence, identify problems with police and prosecutors, and recommend solutions “to strengthen the integrity of the criminal justice system.” 
If approved, it would mark the second involvement of the U.S. Justice Department in Suffolk law enforcement in recent years. 
Sini said the review would “take a hard look” at both old cases and more recent prosecutions where there have been substantial claims of innocence or where there is evidence of possible wrongdoing by police and prosecutors. Along with the 44-year-old case of Bush, who claimed his 1975 murder confession resulted from a police beating, Sini said the new study will examine “cases where confessions were taken without videotaping and where defendants have consistently maintained their innocence.” 
Howard S. Master, who heads the DA’s Conviction Integrity Bureau created by Sini last year, will oversee the federally funded review if the grant is approved. On May 22, Master and a team of CIB investigators issued a lengthy report that resulted in a Suffolk judge throwing out Bush’s conviction for the 1975 murder of a North Bellport teenager, largely because of improper actions by police and the trial prosecutor, including withholding evidence about another potential suspect in the case. The judge’s exoneration of Bush reflected many findings in a Newsday-News 12 investigation published a few days before. 
The federal initiative, called “Upholding the Rule of Law and Preventing Wrongful Convictions Program,” promotes joint criminal justice studies between prosecutors and outside entities such as NY&nbsp;Law School’s Post-Conviction Innocence Clinic run by law professor Adele Bernhard, who handled Bush’s long legal fight to exonerate himself. As a result of the Bush case, Master invited Bernhard to join in applying for the federal study, which she called a unique opportunity for law students to learn the intricacies of complex criminal prosecutions. 
“It’s very exciting,” Bernhard said of the federal program, which would provide about $275,000 in funding for a study lasting about two years. “Many of my students become prosecutors themselves and it’s important that they’re taking these ethical responsibilities seriously.” 
In addition to the Bush case, Sini said, this proposed study would help sort through the merits of more than 80 petitions from defendants seeking to vacate their convictions, including a claim of innocence in a 1990s murder case that is now being actively investigated by the CIB. 
Sini said this initial sorting of petitions would allow the Conviction Integrity Bureau to determine where they will focus their efforts, which he said can be costly and time-consuming. The bureau’s investigation of the Bush case took many months and involved Master and a team of several prosecutors and investigators who examined hundreds of court documents and testimony and interviewed witnesses, including Bush himself. 
Sini also said he expects the study to look at more recent murder cases handled by former Assistant District Attorney Glenn Kurtzrock, who was forced to resign in 2017. Two of Kurtzrock’s murder cases fell apart because of alleged misconduct involving the withholding of evidence. Sini also said the panel may review past cases cited in a 1989 state Commission of Investigation report that criticized Suffolk’s handling of homicide prosecutions and other felony investigations. 
Suffolk Police Commissioner Geraldine Hart says she’s supportive of this study proposal. “If the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office is awarded this grant, we will work together on beneficial training opportunities and partner to identify and address any systemic issues,” said Hart. “We are committed to having the best practices in place to guarantee the integrity of the cases we put forward.” Hart has selected Insp. Milagros Soto, who is assigned to the Office of the Commissioner, as the new liaison to the DA’s Conviction Integrity Bureau. 
If the federal grant is approved by October as expected, the new study would join another U.S. Justice Department review of Suffolk law-enforcement already under way. Since 2014, the Justice Department has been reviewing public complaints of biased policing, allegations of police misconduct, and efforts to improve police oversight as part of a legal settlement with Suffolk County, prompted by Latino community complaints following the 2008 hate-crime killing of an Ecuadorean immigrant, Marcelo Lucero, by a group of teenagers in Patchogue. Last fall, Hart said her department “continues to make significant progress” in reaching Justice Department improvement goals. 
Sini said the proposed study would focus mainly on murder convictions and other major cases handled by police and prosecutors. This federal wrongful convictions program, according to the Justice Department website, is designed to identify “potentially legitimate” claims of innocence by convicted defendants and “enact measures to prevent future errors,” while also seeking “to identify actual perpetrators of crime.” The Justice Department says the program is meant help police and prosecutors to come up with better methods and policies, as well as defense lawyers and the courts, to prevent wrongful convictions. 
In the aftermath of Bush’s exoneration, Hart said her department would cooperate fully with the DA’s Conviction Integrity Bureau in its review of possible wrongdoing in cases. Hart warned that any officer found to have lied under oath would be fired and prosecuted for perjury. In the Bush case, the bureau discredited police testimony about Bush’s alleged confession, showing how it was contradicted by forensic evidence. The bureau also reported that one of the detectives who took Bush’s signed 1975 confession showed a “racial animus” toward Bush, using a racial epithet when recently interviewed by bureau investigators. 
Many of the concerns about possible prosecutorial misconduct in Suffolk, such as the Kurtzrock cases, revolve around violations of the “Brady rule”. That term refers to a landmark 1963 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brady vs. Maryland, declaring that the prosecution must turn over all exculpatory evidence prior to trial that could shed light on a defendant’s innocence. In June, shortly after Bush’s exoneration, Sini requested the resignation of prosecutor Andrew Weiss after the failure to disclose evidence in an arson case caused the DA’s office to drop it. 
Sini has been adamant that official wrongdoing won’t be tolerated by his office but has acknowledged a previous “culture” of corruption that “unfortunately infected certain parts of the Suffolk County criminal justice system.” His predecessor, former DA Thomas Spota, is facing federal corruption charges and is expected to go on trial later this year for allegedly helping to cover up wrongdoing by former Suffolk Chief of Police James Burke. 
Sini said he wants the new study to look at other cases handled by the detectives and the trial prosecutor in the Bush case. Both Sini and Bernhard say it will be difficult to determine if there are any more “innocent man” cases like Bush’s. Bush spent 33 years in prison fighting for his freedom and another decade on parole. But for defendants who claim they were wrongfully convicted, this new effort might give them a chance to prove themselves. 
“I think there is a concern that there may be other [innocent] cases like Bush’s,” Bernhard said. “But I don’t know who they might be.” 
Editor's note -- A previous version of this story incorrectly identified the New York Law School.

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Suffolk DA, legal clinic seek federal grant to study innocence claims

Suffolk DA, legal clinic seek grant on wrongful convictions

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A high-ranking Suffolk police official recently appointed to help root out ethical problems in wrongful conviction&nbsp;cases — such as&nbsp;last month’s murder exoneration of Keith Bush — has been&nbsp;removed from that liaison role, Newsday has learned. 
Deputy Inspector Thomas Kenneally, the commanding officer of the Major Crimes Bureau, was assigned earlier this month by Police Commissioner Geraldine Hart to assist the district attorney's Conviction Integrity Bureau with “important investigations” of reviewing claims of innocence in past cases. In appointing Kenneally as the new liaison, Hart promised to hold her department to the “highest standards” and vowed any police member caught lying under oath would be prosecuted and fired from the department. 
Shortly afterward, Hart reconsidered and yanked his appointment to avoid any conflicts with the CIB’s work, but declined to provide the reason why. 
“The department is committed to this partnership and wants the focus to be on the great work being done — not on our appointee,” Hart said in a written response to Newsday, which mentioned removing Kenneally as liaison. “Therefore, a new candidate will be selected.” The department has yet to name his replacement, a department spokeswoman&nbsp;said. 
Kenneally did not respond to attempts seeking his comment. Suffolk police officials refused to discuss any questions about Kenneally’s past, citing privacy laws. “Pursuant to New York Civil Rights Law Section 50-a, all personnel records — which include all disciplinary records — of police officers are confidential and cannot be released,” the department said in a written response to Newsday’s inquiry about Kenneally’s past records. 
A spokesman&nbsp;for the district attorney declined to comment and referred questions to the police department. 
In removing Kenneally, Hart also praised him. “Deputy Inspector Thomas Kenneally was selected to work with the Conviction Integrity Bureau because of his exemplary career spanning more than 25 years,” she said in a statement. A spokeswoman&nbsp;said Hart was unaware of any issue surrounding Kenneally’s past before appointing him as liaison. 
The widespread publicity surrounding last month’s exoneration of Bush’s 1976 murder conviction — one of the longest-running “innocent man” cases in U.S. history — has put a spotlight on Suffolk’s police and prosecutorial methods. A CIB report filed on May 22 discredited police testimony surrounding Bush’s alleged confession to killing North Bellport teenager Sherese Watson, which Bush says was beaten out of him. The CIB also raised questions about how incriminating evidence about another suspect, characterized as the likely killer, remained undisclosed in law-enforcement files for four decades until discovered by Bush’s lawyer through a Freedom of Information Law request. 
Since 2017, questions about improper conduct have resulted&nbsp;in the removal of two Suffolk DA prosecutors and caused some homicide and other felony cases to fall apart. Last year, District Attorney Timothy Sini set up the CIB to review claims of wrongful convictions. Sini, who served as Suffolk police commissioner before taking office as DA in 2018, has distanced himself from the tenure of his predecessor, former DA Thomas Spota. Spota is facing federal corruption charges for allegedly attempting to cover up wrongdoing by former Suffolk Chief of Police James Burke. 
Overall, the CIB has received about 80 requests for review of past Suffolk convictions, including the Bush case. It is actively investigating three other cases, including claims of possible innocence in a 1990s homicide conviction that involves allegations of a coerced police confession. 
Hart has pledged her department’s cooperation in these reviews. “Our shared goal of the District Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Bureau is to ensure equitable justice,” she said in a statement.

POPOLICE190624

New Suffolk police liaison on ethical issues reassigned

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A month after&nbsp;Keith Bush was exonerated in&nbsp;a&nbsp;1975 murder&nbsp;case, the Suffolk District Attorney's office&nbsp;is&nbsp;investigating another&nbsp;homicide conviction from the 1990s based on claims of&nbsp;possible innocence, Newsday has learned.&nbsp; 
The homicide case is one of three active&nbsp;probes&nbsp;of previous felony&nbsp;convictions being conducted&nbsp;by the DA's Conviction Integrity Bureau, according to its chief Howard S. Master. The unit was set up last year by District Attorney Timothy Sini to investigate claims of&nbsp;wrongful&nbsp;convictions. 
Declining to reveal&nbsp;the convicted murderer’s name, Master said this latest review&nbsp;focuses&nbsp;primarily&nbsp;on claims of a coerced police confession rather than allegations of improper actions by prosecutors. The male homicide defendant served time behind bars, Master said, but has since been released on parole. 
“This is not one of the cases where someone’s liberty is being affected, but it’s on his criminal record, no doubt,” said Master, declining to provide further details. 
The CIB is&nbsp;reviewing available police and court records about the murder&nbsp;and consulting with the defendant’s attorney, who brought the conviction to the DA’s attention,&nbsp;Master&nbsp;said. The CIB’s review will take a few months before coming to a conclusion,&nbsp;he added. 
In addition to the&nbsp;homicide case, the&nbsp;Suffolk&nbsp;CIB is also&nbsp;investigating claims of wrongful conviction in a&nbsp;second&nbsp;case involving a vehicular homicide and another involving robbery, but Master wouldn’t provide any more details. 
Last month, a Suffolk judge threw out the conviction of Bush, 62, who had been&nbsp;accused of murder and attempted sexual abuse in the 1975 killing of a North Babylon teenager Sherese Watson. Newly obtained evidence showed Bush’s trial prosecutor improperly concealed police documents about another potential murder suspect, John W. Jones Jr., who admitted to tripping over Watson’s body at the murder scene. 
Bush served&nbsp;a total 33 years in prison and another decade on parole as a sex-offender. 
The CIB, headed by Master, conducted a nearly yearlong review of the Bush case before recommending on May 22 that he be exonerated. The Bush case is one of the longest-running “innocent man” cases in modern U.S. judicial history, records show. 
As with the Bush case, this new claim of a wrongful conviction in the 1990s murder case involves an alleged confession taken by Suffolk police. “There is a similarity to Bush with [allegations of] a coerced confession but not a physical violation” by detectives, Master said. 
At the time of his 1975 arrest, Bush, then 17 years old with no previous criminal history, charged that&nbsp;a signed confession was beaten out of him by police, which detectives denied at his trial.&nbsp;The recent CIB report discredited the testimony of the Suffolk police who put together Bush’s written confession and said one of the detectives showed a “racial animus” when recently questioned about Bush. 
Bush tried unsuccessfully for many years to clear his name, especially after a key witness against him recanted in 1981 and when Suffolk crime lab tests in the mid-2000s showed DNA found on Watson’s body came from an unidentified male and ruled out Bush. 
A year ago, Bush’s attorney sought once again to exonerate him,&nbsp;after a Freedom of Information Law request revealed long-suppressed documents about Jones. The CIB eventually agreed that Bush’s 1976 prosecutor had failed to disclose&nbsp;&nbsp;information exculpatory to Bush's case about another&nbsp;potential murder suspect, Jones&nbsp;before trial as required legally. 
Master said this 1990s homicide case doesn’t appear to include any such prosecutorial violations.&nbsp;The case was referred to the CIB by an attorney for the Innocence Project, a legal nonprofit based in Manhattan, which declined to provide further details about the ongoing review. 
Suffolk’s methods of obtaining confessions in murder cases&nbsp;has been a longtime source of controversy. It&nbsp;was the focus of Newsday’s 1986 series, “The Confession-Takers,” which was later cited in a 1989 state Commission of Investigation report which faulted police and prosecutors for permitting improper actions, including perjury, in pursuing homicide prosecutions. Bush’s lawyer also cited the series and state report in seeking his successful exoneration last month. 
Sini’s office has investigated other more recent examples of prosecutorial misconduct in murder cases and other serious felonies that fell apart because of legal and ethical violations. Sini’s predecessor, former Suffolk DA Thomas Spota, is expected to go on trial this fall on federal charges for allegedly covering up criminal wrongdoing by former Police Commissioner James Burke. 
Since it began last year, the CIB has received more than 80 petitions for review of past convictions, and seriously considered about 30, including the Bush case. To help&nbsp;its ongoing effort, the Suffolk DA’s office recently applied for a $500,000 federal grant, which provides sophisticated DNA testing for post-conviction cases “in which actual innocence might be demonstrated,” according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

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Suffolk DA probing claim of wrongful conviction in murder case

Suffolk DA probing claim of wrongful conviction

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Vowing that police perjury “will not be tolerated,” Suffolk County Police Commissioner Geraldine Hart has appointed a high-ranking supervisor to work with the district attorney’s Conviction Integrity Bureau to root out any ethical problems in prosecutions and said she will fire any police officer who deliberately lies under oath. 
The&nbsp;move comes&nbsp;less than a month after a judge threw out the 1976 murder conviction of Keith Bush because of alleged illegal actions by law-enforcement officials. 
“We hold our members to the highest standards, and anyone who intentionally provides false testimony will be prosecuted and the department will seek termination,” Hart said in a written statement. 
To underline her commitment, Hart said she was assigning Suffolk Deputy Inspector Thomas Kenneally, the commanding officer of the Major Crimes Bureau, to work with the Conviction Integrity Bureau set up by Suffolk District Attorney Tim Sini “as it seeks the ethical administration of justice.” 
The commissioner’s action&nbsp;comes after a Suffolk judge decided on May 22 to vacate the 1976 conviction of Bush, who was&nbsp;accused of&nbsp;killing Bellport teenager Sherese Watson after a neighborhood party. Hart’s statement was in response to Newsday’s questions after&nbsp;Bush’s exoneration. 
In clearing Bush’s name, a nearly 100-page report by the Conviction Integrity Bureau showed that police and at least one prosecutor knew about another potential suspect, John W. Jones Jr., who admitted in 1975 to tripping over Watson’s body at the murder scene. However, that evidence was never disclosed at Bush’s 1976 trial.&nbsp;Now 62, Bush spent&nbsp;33 years in prison and another decade on parole as a convicted sex offender. 
The district attorney’s report last month questioned the validity of a written confession taken from Bush by Suffolk detectives in January 1975. Bush, then 17, said he was beaten by police and forced to sign the statement. On the witness stand, Suffolk detectives attested to the confession’s truthfulness and repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. But Sini’s investigators found that Bush’s alleged confession was contradicted by forensic evidence that found it “materially false” and that one of the detectives who questioned Bush recently “alluded to use of coercive tactics.” 
Hart’s comments come at a time when Sini has expressed similar ethical concerns about prosecutors who fail to disclose important information to defense lawyers and judges before trial as required under legal rules. The DA’s report in the Bush case criticized Suffolk’s then- lead prosecutor for never revealing evidence about Jones, whom prosecutors now believe likely killed Watson. 
In recent years, similar issues of proper disclosure of evidence by prosecutors has affected other Suffolk cases. Earlier this month, Andrew Weiss, the head of Sini’s Public Integrity Bureau, resigned because of apparent ethical and legal violations involving a troubled arson case against two firefighters. Sini said his office won’t tolerate prosecutorial violations of long-established disclosure rules mandated by the courts, and praised Hart for her strong stance against any possible perjury by police in criminal cases. 
Since becoming DA in January 2018, Sini has sought to separate his office’s actions from his predecessor, former District Attorney Thomas Spota, whose tenure included other murder cases that fell apart because of legal and ethical violations. One prosecutor, Glenn Kurtzrock, resigned for allegedly hiding evidence about another suspect in a 2017 murder case. 
Spota is facing&nbsp;trial this fall on charges of covering up criminal wrongdoing by then-Suffolk Police Chief of Department James Burke, who had&nbsp;pleaded guilty to violating a suspect’s rights and obstructing justice. 
In her statement, Hart also responded to two flaws revealed in the Bush case — an alleged murder weapon that was lost in the early 1980s while in police custody, as well as criticism that the department had not properly responded to Bush’s Freedom of Information Law requests in seeking all available records about his criminal case, including the evidence of another suspect. 
Without commenting specifically on those examples, Hart said that&nbsp;her department is “utilizing cutting-edge tools in identifying, gathering, and securing physical evidence” and that the department “continually reviews policies and procedures” to make sure it reacts appropriately with FOIL requests. 
The district attorney’s office said it will continue to review other possible wrongdoing in the way Suffolk has handled previous criminal prosecutions. “The partnership between the Police Department and the Conviction Integrity Bureau will continue to evolve and we are excited about that,” Sini said, after Bush’s exoneration. Despite recent improvements in crime-fighting, he said, “none of that matters if we do not correct the injustices of the past.”

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After Bush case, Suffolk police head moves to root out ethical problems

Suffolk police head moves to root out ethical problems

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Taxpayers may face a multi-million dollar penalty for the wrongful murder conviction of Keith Bush, who was exonerated last month after 44 years of trying to prove his innocence – one of the longest-running cases of its kind in modern U.S. history, legal experts say. 
Just how much Bush might collect is unclear. But experts say the ultimate bill could be $30 million or more, based on other similar examples of wrongful convictions. 
Nationally, recent payouts for long-term cases like Bush’s “are exceeding $1 million” for each year spent behind bars by an exonerated defendant, according to Jeffrey Gutman, a George Washington University law professor who has studied such cases. Locally, after a long legal battle, Nassau County last year paid a $43.7 million judgment won by two men convicted of 1984 rape and murder and later exonerated after 18 years of imprisonment. 
In January 1975, Bush was accused of the sex-related killing of a Bellport High School teenager following a neighborhood party. Bush spent a total 33 years in prison and subsequent years on parole as a convicted sex offender. 
Now 62, Bush’s conviction on murder and attempted sexual abuse was vacated on May 22 by a Suffolk judge after Bush’s lawyer Adele Bernhard and Suffolk District Attorney Tim Sini’s Conviction Integrity Bureau found several examples of questionable evidence, including that Suffolk authorities at the time of Bush's 1976 trial knew of another potential murder suspect but failed to disclose it. 
“He lost many years of his life and it will be up to a judge and jury to decide what he’s entitled to,” said Justin Block, president of the Suffolk County Bar Association and part of a three-person advisory panel that reviewed the Bush case at Sini’s request. “But you can understand why he wants to be compensated for what he’s lost.” 
Bush has yet to file a lawsuit, but told Newsday he intends to do so. Because he spent so many years in prison falsely accused, Bush said he doesn’t have much of a work history from which he can receive Social Security, a pension or other benefits. 
“It could be astronomical,” said attorney Emma Freudenberger about the potential damage award for Bush. Freudenberger represented Martin Tankleff, another Suffolk murder defendant who spent 17 years in prison before his conviction was overturned by an appellate court. Tankleff last year received $10 million in a federal lawsuit settlement against Suffolk County and another $3.4 million in a state settlement. 
Experts say long-running cases of wrongful convictions can result in separate awards from federal civil lawsuits as well as state payouts under New York’s Unjust Imprisonment and Conviction Act. Despite such potential damage awards, however, seeking compensation isn’t always a sure bet, they say. Cases that go to trial run the risk of losing. But settlements can bring a smaller award than those cases that prevail before a jury. 
“It’s not an easy road – it’s not at all automatic,” said attorney Frederick K. Brewington, who in recent years has brought several civil cases against local law enforcement for improper actions. 
Brewington said figuring out the amount of potential damages for someone wrongly imprisoned can be complicated. In such cases, he said, an economist might be called upon to estimate the amount of lost income&nbsp;—an equation based on the skills, education and years lost. A psychiatrist or other trained professional may also assess the amount of psychological damage inflicted upon a person “for being convicted of something you didn’t do,” said Brewington. 
In some cases, lawyers for municipalities may vigorously oppose allegations of wrongdoing by local law enforcement officials. In Bush’s case, however, a report prepared by DA Sini’s Conviction Integrity Bureau already detailed improper actions by Suffolk police and prosecutors that helped lead to Bush’s long-term imprisonment. 
If Bush pursues a federal civil lawsuit, it could reveal even more wrongdoing that took place, said Freudenberger, showing that the discredited police allegations against Bush were “part of a pattern of fabricated confessions and inadequate supervision that condoned it.” 
Nevertheless, Gutman said many exonerated defendants like Bush, after many years of imprisonment, are eager to get on with their lives and accept a lower amount in a settlement rather than wait years for a lawsuit to be decided. As Gutman said, “He might want to trade off dollars for speed.” 
A spokesman for the Suffolk County attorney declined comment for this story.

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Keith Bush wrongful conviction case may lead to large Suffolk payout

Keith Bush case may lead to large Suffolk payout

Keith Bush — who spent 33 years in prison — is no longer a convicted murderer or a registered sex offender, after a Suffolk judge vacated his conviction Wednesday as a result of a joint application from his lawyer and Suffolk District Attorney Timothy Sini.


After 33 years in prison as an innocent man, Keith Bush is finally free

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Keith Bush is no longer a convicted murderer or a registered sex offender, after a Suffolk judge vacated his conviction Wednesday as a result of a joint application from his lawyer and Suffolk District Attorney Timothy Sini. 
“Mr. Bush, I cannot give you back that which was taken from you in the 1970s,” Suffolk County Court Judge Anthony Senft said in a Riverhead courtroom filled to capacity. “But I can give you back your presumption of innocence. … I wish you well, sir.” 
“Thank you, sir,” Bush said quietly. 
His attorney, Adele Bernhard, who runs New York Law School’s Post-Conviction Innocence Clinic, thanked the judge and Sini. 
“Sometimes, in the words of Martin Luther King Jr., the arc of the universe does bend to justice, and it has in this case,” she said. “A wrongful conviction affects the whole community, and it takes a whole community to set it straight.” 
“I am truly humbled by this decision,” Bush said in court. He later said he feels sorrow not only for the decades he lost, but for the family&nbsp;of the victim, which will never know for sure who strangled 14-year-old Sherese Watson in North Bellport in January 1975. Bush served 32&nbsp;years in prison after he was convicted of second-degree murder. Until Wednesday, he was still on parole and registered as a sex offender. 
Bush was a 17-year-old junior at Bellport High School when Suffolk authorities charged him with killing Watson&nbsp;after a late-night house party. Watson’s body was found in an lot full of weeds not far away from the party. 
Bernhard and the chief of Sini's Conviction Integrity Bureau, Howard Master, formally filed the motion to undo the&nbsp;criminal case against Bush minutes after the Arthur M. Cromarty Criminal Court Complex opened at 9 a.m. The motion sought to vacate Bush's entire criminal case noting that&nbsp;police and prosecutors hid evidence favorable to Bush and manufactured evidence against him, including a false confession that Bush&nbsp;only signed after what he said was a prolonged beating by police. 
About an hour later, Senft's courtroom filled with lawyers, reporters and, finally, Bush's family and friends. Bush's&nbsp;mother, Lorraine Bush-Bolling, and fiancee, Dora Moore, came with him from Bridgeport, Connecticut, where he lives now. 
Sini took the rare step of addressing the court himself. He urged Senft to grant the defense request to set aside Bush's case.&nbsp;"The law and justice so requires," he said. 
Bush said in court that he was grateful to Sini's office for being the first to listen to him and Bernhard.&nbsp;"Someone sat down and listened to me," he said. 
As the proceeding ended, the courtroom was flooded with applause. One woman shouted, "Happy day!" 
The emotion carried out into the hallway, where Bush's mother sobbed in relief&nbsp;as&nbsp;she suffered from heart palpitations. Court officers cared for her and she was taken later to Peconic Bay Medical Center in Riverhead. 
In a news conference moments later, Sini praised the investigation that Bernhard did for Bush. His office spent the past year verifying her years of work. 
"Mr. Bush wouldn't be here without her work and her clinic's work," Sini said. "It's an honor to work with her." 
He then turned to Bush, seated next to him, and said, "On behalf of the Suffolk district attorney's office and the law enforcement community, I'm sorry." 
Sini recounted the investigation and what it found, including the discovery of an alternative suspect&nbsp;in the killing, John W. Jones Jr., who has since died. Detectives were aware that Jones had admitted to stumbling over Watson's body, but they hid all evidence of him from Bush's defense and the court. 
Sini said his office is committed to fighting present-day crime, but he added, "None of that matters if we don't correct the injustices of the past." 
He said later: "This was a window into a very dark aspect of Suffolk County's history. … I hope people are paying attention in the criminal justice community, including in my office." 
The injustices in this case were many, Sini said. They included a coerced false confession, a young woman bullied into giving false eyewitness testimony about seeing Bush and Watson together,&nbsp;"junk science" suggesting fibers from Bush's clothing were under Watson's fingernails and the hiding of Jones' existence. 
"Any person with brain functioning is going to investigate that person for the murder of Sherese Watson," Sini said. "But instead they washed it. They covered it up." 
Bernhard said she took on the case&nbsp;after Bush wrote to her in 2006 and read the confession that he signed. 
"I didn't believe a word of it," she said of the confession. "It made no sense." 
She noted that the detectives involved in the case were mentioned in a <a href="https://www.newsday.com/the-confession-takers-1.31761145">"fantastic series" by Newsday</a> in the 1980s about how Suffolk homicide detectives relied heavily on confessions, some of which were false. 
And then she met Bush herself. "He is, as you can see, a humble, upstanding, lovely person. … He is a beacon. He was an inspiration to me." 
When it was Bush's turn to speak, he spoke up for the murder victim. 
"Although this is a special day, it is a&nbsp;sad day for Sherese Watson and her family," he said. "There is no closure for her family." 
Bush said 44 years was a "lifetime" to fight for his innocence, and he was grateful that Bernhard and Sini's office restored his faith in the justice system. 
"Because of my attorney, the current district attorney's office — they shook up my pessimism about the system," he said.

poDA190523

Judge vacates Keith Bush's 1976 murder conviction

Bush on vacated murder conviction: 'I am truly humbled'

For all the calmness of his demeanor and the softness of his voice Wednesday, Keith Bush said he is not a forgiving man. 
He does not forgive the Suffolk police detectives who, he said, used the N-word while beating him into making a confession in the murder of a young woman in Bellport in the 1970s, rather than doing their job — which was running down leads that pointed to another potential suspect. 
He does not forgive Suffolk prosecutors, who ignored those leads — and withheld them, along with other information, from Bush’s defense lawyer — during trial.   
There can be no forgiveness, he said, because of the pain his family suffered. 
Especially, he said, his mother. 
There can be no forgiveness, Bush said in an interview, because of the pain still suffered by the family of Sherese Watson, who was killed at age 14 after a late-night house party in North Bellport. 
“There is no closure for her family,” Bush said after Judge Anthony Senft vacated his conviction in Watson’s 1975 murder. 
Bush was standing in the library of the Suffolk district attorney’s office in Riverhead, two floors up from where Senft, some 60 minutes earlier, had apologized to Bush, who had been fighting for 44 years to prove his innocence. 
Thirty-three years of that had been in prison. 
Bush could have gained parole earlier, Suffolk District Attorney Timothy Sini pointed out. 
But he maintained his innocence, rather than say he was guilty. 
“He said he was not going to let them do to him as a man what they did to him as a child,” Sini said. 
When Bush was released from prison, young family members would say later as they waited outside the courthouse for Bush to finish up some paperwork, it was as if Bush had emerged from the Stone Age. 
“He was, like, ‘The TV can do that?’&nbsp;&nbsp;” one young woman said, referring to Bush’s reaction to how markedly technology had evolved during his time in prison. 
“Yeah,” another agreed, with a gentle laugh at the memory, “he was a caveman.” 
But for the family, the judge’s action in wiping the slate clean — which included taking Bush off a sex-offender registry — had other ramifications. 
“There are a lot of kids in the family, and he wasn’t supposed to be around them,” a relative said. “That’s all gone now.”   
For almost an hour, after family members moved from the courtroom to the library to listen to a news conference, Sini outlined what his office had discovered during an examination of Bush’s case. 
Those findings were included in a joint application with Bush’s attorney to have his indictment and conviction vacated. 
Sini apologized, as friends and several members of Bush’s family recorded the news conference on their cell phones. 
Sometimes Bush’s supporters applauded. Sometimes, as Sini recounted evidence lost, inconsistencies in evidence and testimony ignored, there were expressions of disbelief. 
But most often, there were expressions of thanks. 
At one point, Bush was asked whether he ever gave up hope. 
No, he said. From the audience, his fiancée agreed, with a slow nod of her head.   
Bush said he has never returned to the community where the young woman was killed. 
And, Bush said, he fought successfully to serve out his probation in Connecticut, where his mother and other family members live, rather than in Suffolk. 
At one point, Bush was asked whether he would ever move back to Suffolk, where some family still live, in Coram and in Bellport. 
The answer came quickly. 
“No,” he said.

Columnists

Joye Brown

liJOYE190523

Keith Bush: I can't forgive those who put me in prison

Brown: Bush can't forgive those who put him in prison

liBUSH190523

After 44 years, Keith Bush’s 1976 murder conviction was vacated by a judge after a district attorney’s report concluded he had been wrongfully convicted of the sex-related murder of teenager Sherese Watson. 
A report filed with the court Wednesday by the Suffolk District Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Bureau detailed how several former Suffolk authorities kept secret evidence of another potential murder suspect who may be the real killer. 
The newly discovered evidence shows that “Bush is actually innocent of the crimes with which he was convicted,” concluded Howard Master, who heads the bureau for Suffolk District Attorney Timothy Sini. Bush, now 62, spent 33 years behind bars and had since been paroled as a sex offender.   
The nearly 100-page report said Bush was wrongfully convicted during a 1976 trial because of several dubious pieces of evidence, including faulty forensic evidence, witnesses who felt intimidated by police and a false signed confession that Bush says he had beaten out of him by homicide detectives. 
Police denied any wrongdoing at the time but the report said one of the former detectives, when questioned recently by Master’s investigators, “alluded to use of coercive tactics” in putting together Bush’s signed confession. Before his January 1975 murder arrest, Bush, then 17, had no criminal history.   
Perhaps most significantly in throwing out the conviction, the report said then-Suffolk authorities violated legal rules by failing to disclose the existence of “alternative suspect” John W. Jones Jr. — who admitted in 1975 to tripping over Watson’s body at the murder scene and leaving behind a plastic comb that he identified as his own. Although Jones was twice given a lie-detector test, Suffolk never mentioned anything about Jones at Bush’s trial, as required by legal precedent. 
“The alternative suspect [Jones] may well have committed the offenses of which Bush was wrongfully convicted,” said the report, which points out Jones’ history of violent and sex-related offenses both before and after Watson’s 1975 murder. The report labeled Jones, who died in 2006, as “perhaps the most viable suspect in Watson’s murder.” 
The report painted a disturbing picture about how Suffolk authorities, particularly trial prosecutor Gerard Sullivan along with then-Suffolk homicide detectives, hid vital information in the Bush case. 
The evidence about Jones “was suppressed before trial and was highly material to Bush’s defense because it could have helped Bush establish that someone else had committed the murder, ” the report concluded.   
Recently, Conviction Integrity Bureau investigators questioned two former homicide former detectives, Dennis Rafferty and August Stahl, who interrogated Bush in January 1975 and put together his signed confession. Through his attorney, Rafferty answered only a limited number of questions posed to him and denied any wrongdoing. But the report said that Stahl, now 90, displayed a “racial animus” and raised former Suffolk District Attorney Thomas Spota’s name in the matter. 
“Why is this thing being opened up again, I thought Tommy Spota took care of this?” Stahl told the investigators, according to the court papers filed Wednesday. 
Spota was a longtime Suffolk district attorney and a former law partner of Sullivan, the prosecutor in the 1976 Bush trial. Spota currently faces federal corruption charges and is expected to go on trial later this year. Spota told Newsday in a story published Monday that he doesn’t remember the Bush case. 
In addition, when questioned recently by investigators, Stahl used a racial epithet when first asked about Bush and said he believed he was guilty. 
The report said that Stahl currently resides in a small enclave in Yaphank owned by the German American Settlement League and that he is a former GASL board member. In 2015, The New York Times identified Stahl’s league as an offshoot of 1930s pro-Nazi sympathizers group who built bungalows there as part of a pro-Nazi summer camp. The DA’s report notes that the bylaws of this community required homeowners to be primarily of “German extraction” until a 2016 settlement of a federal discrimination lawsuit and a follow-up settlement with the state attorney general.   
When called for comment, Stahl denied any bias and said he had not talked with Spota about the case. He said his comment to investigators was a general reaction to the ongoing efforts by Bush to prove his innocence. 
The report confirmed evidence developed over the past decade by Bush’s defense lawyer, Adele Bernhard, a professor at New York Law School. She argued that male DNA evidence taken from Watson’s body didn’t match Bush’s and that a recanting witness, Maxine Bell, and other witnesses for Bush should be believed. 
The report also found fault with 1976 trial prosecution testimony that claimed a metal comb discovered at Bush’s home was used him in the attack on Watson, who died from strangulation. Wounds on the dead girl’s body showed that it didn’t match the spacing on the comb’s tines. The report also said that testimony offered about fibers found at the murder scene is considered unreliable by today’s forensic standards.

DA's report: Keith Bush was wrongfully convicted of 1975 murder

DA's report: Bush was wrongfully convicted of murder

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