Brian Kendall was 16 when Brooklyn detectives arrested him for a deadly capturing exterior a Flatbush online game parlor, regardless of eyewitnesses describing an older, heavier gunman and telling police {the teenager} wasn’t the shooter.
Twenty-five years later — after his homicide conviction was overturned when prosecutors concluded he was “possible harmless” — Kendall is suing New York Metropolis, alleging detectives fabricated proof, manipulated witnesses and hid exculpatory info that despatched him to jail earlier than he was deported to Guyana.
“The go well with is for the NYPD and district lawyer to be held accountable,” Kendall, 55, advised The Metropolis Reporter. “Again within the ‘80s there was lots of misconduct. This was a follow taking place throughout.”
A couple of week after the Feb. 24, 1988, capturing, police took Kendall from his mother and father’ Flatbush condo in handcuffs. They stated two eyewitnesses recognized him because the gunman and charged him with the homicide of 20-year-old Raphael Reyes, who was fatally shot contained in the constructing on Cortelyou Highway.
The lawsuit, filed in Brooklyn federal court docket, says detectives with the NYPD’s Brooklyn South Murder Squad ignored eyewitness accounts that contradicted their idea of the case. As a substitute, they constructed a homicide prosecution round manipulated witness statements and unreliable identifications, in accordance with the go well with.
“We’ll evaluate the case and reply within the litigation,” stated metropolis Regulation Division spokesperson Nicholas Paolucci.
Kendall is looking for damages from the town, a former detective, and the estates of two case detectives who’ve since handed away. The lawsuit doesn’t search a selected greenback quantity.
In accordance with the lawsuit, witnesses constantly described the shooter as a brief, heavyset man in his mid-20s. Kendall was a thin 16-year-old. One witness advised police the gunman remained contained in the Recreation Room whereas Kendall had been taking part in video video games.
The lawsuit additionally alleges detectives used suggestive picture arrays till witnesses recognized Kendall, withheld exculpatory witness statements from prosecutors and protection attorneys, relied on testimony that modified repeatedly after police interviews and pressured Kendall into falsely confessing by telling him he might go residence if he admitted involvement.
“I assumed it was an enormous mistake that they’d right,” Kendall advised The Metropolis Reporter.
In 2022, the Brooklyn District Lawyer’s Conviction Evaluate Unit reopened the case after reinvestigating the proof. Prosecutors finally concluded Kendall was “possible harmless,” citing eyewitness accounts that had been neglected, unreliable witness testimony and proof that had by no means been disclosed to the protection.
A choose vacated his conviction and dismissed the indictment.
Kendall and his authorized group argued that he was by no means given a good probability by detectives and the prosecutor dealing with the case.
Contained in the police precinct, officers put him in a lineup and refused to let him name a lawyer, in accordance with his account.
His household employed a non-public lawyer, Harry Dusenberry, who interviewed not less than 5 folks inside the sport room on the time. All of them stated Kendall had nothing to do with the homicide, in accordance with the 35-page CRU report.
Most of the identical folks spoke to prosecutors on the time, the report stated.
The case was earlier than a choose, Francis Egitto, who had a popularity of doling out most sentences.
Dusenberry, in flip, advised the household that it could be “suicide” for Kendall to proceed to trial the place he would nearly absolutely be convicted and sentenced to 25 years to life, in accordance with the CRU report.
“I had no selection,” Kendall remembered, including that he was by no means advised he’d be deported on the finish of his sentence.
Kendall, who had been a authorized everlasting U.S. resident, served 16 years and eight months in jail earlier than he was launched in 2004. He was deported to Guyana, the place he was born, the next yr.
Throughout his time in jail, Kendall’s mom and older sister each handed away.
The lawsuit says the detectives’ conduct mirrored broader NYPD customs and follows that tolerated coercive interrogations, suggestive eyewitness identification procedures and failures to reveal exculpatory proof.
“Brian Kendall misplaced a long time of his life as a result of regulation enforcement constructed a case towards him as an alternative of following the proof,” stated Julia P. Kuan, a companion at Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel LLP. “He spent years in jail, was deported from the nation he referred to as residence and separated from his household. This lawsuit is about holding these accountable accountable.”
