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Photo by John Wilcox
Freed prisoner taking Boston to court
Says cops withheld evidence in 1971 murder case
LEGAL ACTION: James Haley, who was imprisoned for 34 years, has filed a lawsuit against the city claiming that police withheld evidence in his murder trial.
A man whose murder conviction was overturned after he spent 34 years behind bars is suing the city of Boston for unspecified damages in U.S. District Court, charging that cops withheld evidence that might have cleared him.
“Hopefully through this lawsuit I can get some measure of a day in court,” said James A. Haley, who was 24 when cops charged him with the fatal stabbing and shooting death of David Myers of Roxbury on July 11, 1971. “I’ve always said I’d be exonerated, but I was hoping sooner rather than later.”
Haley, 62, was convicted of first degree murder in March 1972. He was released briefly during an unsuccessful appeal, but returned to prison until his sentence was overturned this past August.
When Haley received reams of evidence from Boston police in 2006 under the Freedom of Information Act, he found that during the trial, two witnesses contradicted their initial statements to cops. Transcripts showed the two witnesses, who could not be reached, first told police they hadn’t seen Haley for more than a month, according to the 18-page complaint filed Wednesday in federal court.
Yet both claimed in court to have seen Haley the day before the murder, according to the suit. Their testimony of that encounter helped link Haley to the murder of Myers, 25, his sister-in-law’s husband, according to the complaint. Prosecutors argued that he was looking for his estranged wife in the apartment where Myers was killed.
The Boston Police (http://news.bostonherald.com/search/?keyword=Boston+Police&searchSite=pubdate) Department declined comment yesterday. The two officers named in the suit are deceased.
Haley’s attorney, James Sultan, said Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley immediately acknowledged Haley had received an unfair trial. “As soon as we brought this miscarriage of justice to their attention, they realized it,” Sultan said.
Conley spokesman Jake Wark said the DA’s office has no plans to bring a new trial “given the state of the evidence after more than 35 years.”
But, Wark stressed, “This is not an exoneration.”
Haley acknowledged having a previous manslaughter conviction stemming from a fight in 1963.
Haley, who is staying with a friend in Cambridge, said he wanted to have children, a family and “a regular, everyday life” - but never got the chance.
“If you’re a thinking individual, prison is a hard place to be,” he said. “Thirty-four years of my life - nothing can get that back.”
lets hope he wins,it will set a good precendent for others,for who have been wrongfully convicted just like Ruben Hurricane Carter.
(http://www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view.bg?articleid=1151842)
Stories like this is gives us a plain definition of Un-Just, there are soo many of our people in jail for no reason!!! just kept there because of who they are so many years gone...I wish this brother success with this case