On June twenty third, nineteen eighty four, at around four am, at a bodega in the Bronx, a male customer bought beer and a twenty five year old woman bought cigarettes. It's unclear whether they knew one another. The store clerk said that the woman willingly got into the male customer's blue and white sedan. However, according to the woman, she was abducted upon leaving the store. Then she was dragged into a park, raped, sodomized, and robbed before chasing the
man down and getting her money back. Then, while waiting for a cab, the same man dragged her into an abandoned building where he again assaulted her, but this time he cut her face with a razor blade, blinding her in her left eye and threatening to kill her if she went to the police. When she awoke, she called first responders and went to the hospital, where she underwent surgery and a rape kit. Police showed her a mugshot book and she chose the picture of a man named
Alan Newton. The store clerk identified Alan as well from a photo array, but on the night of the crime, Alan had stayed with his fiance's family in Queens, all of whom had said that no one had left in the middle of the night. Curiously, no zerology was presented at trial, only two very shaky IDAs from the witness and the victim, who could not agree on whether the
victim knew her assailant or not. Advances in DNA testing would be all that Allan needed to eventually disprove his accusers, but only if the police could be bothered to locate the rape kit right where it had always been for twenty two long years. This is Wrongful Conviction. Welcome back
to Wrongful Conviction today. Well, this is long overdue because ever since I started doing this podcast back in two thousand and six, team, I've thought a lot about this case of the man you're about to hear from in person, Alan Newton, and I don't know why we haven't gotten around to it till now, but I'm so glad we're going to do it today because this is a story that needs to be heard, and it's a hard one to hear, by the way, and I'm very, very excited
and honored to have you here today, Alan Newton, Welcome to Wronful Conviction.
Thank you. Jason. Definitely appreciate what y'all, guy is doing as far as getting our story out there.
So let's go back before this happened, and before you were exposed to the worst that our criminal legal system has to offer. Your life was pretty good, right.
Fairy decent. I was working, had graduated high school, and my mind, you know, back in nineteen eighty four, living my best life and appearing when to go to college in a couple of years is and that's an ordinary young guy just living my life.
I mean, you're working for the New York Telephone Company obviously a name that doesn't exist anymore, but New York Telephone Company for people who remember that far back, was a big company in New York, obviously, and you were going to hip hop dance parties in the Bronx, which was again like that was the popular thing to do back then. And if I understand correctly, you were also engaged at the time, right.
Yes, I was living in the Bronx. My fiance was living in Queens, so I was working in Manhattan. So I was basically traveling around New York City through the bows and parties.
Just making your way, right like any other twenty three year old guy would be doing at the time. And so you had one previous incident that I guess put you on the radar of the authorities, right, Can you tell us about that?
It was the year in nineteen seventy nine, two three months before I graduated high school, and I was at a party and got in a fight with another young teenager at my age and got a battery charge. And unfortunately, it was the photographs and the police mug shot books that the victim supposedly picked out to connect me to this longful conviction of us.
Yeah. I mean we've heard that story before, whether it's with the John Asier Velasque's case or so many other cases where some minor infraction for which somebody in a different zip code probably wouldn't have been arrested or charged. But you know, a little high school incident, a fight.
I'm not saying a fight isn't a serious thing, but it was a fight among two teenage boys, which happens every day in different cities all over the country, and ninety nine percent of the time no charges are filed. But you know, in the poorer communities, people of color, you can end up with a record that could end up with a mugshot in a book that can end up in a wrongful conviction, and it happens time and again, and that's exactly what happened in this case.
And you're absolutely right because you know later on on learning about the case and all that the other guy that had to fight with wasn't coming to court. So it really wasn't anybody, you know, pushing the case along through the justice system. But in my ignorance, not knowing better and just wanting to move on because I was working and losing days at work, you know, coming back and forth to court, I decided just to take a bleed.
And like you said, under different circumstances and another zip code, the case with it. Just like you said, it's just a fight between teenagers at a party. But that's not the way the justice system, like the dol out punishment when it comes to certain communities, it's more so about putting people through the criminal justice system and making sure that they have a record for the rest of their lives.
So that brings us right up to the time of the crime. Now. At four am on June twenty third, nineteen eighty four, a twenty five year old woman stopped at a convenience during the bronze to buy cigarettes, and there are some conflicts in the narrative between the victim and the store clerk that had an impact later in the compromised way in which the jury decided the case.
So back to the night of the crime, the store clerk said that the assailant also came into the store at that time and bought a beer before returning to his car, a blue and white Sadan, where he was honking his horn for the victim. In this case, the store clerk said that the victim went to the car voluntarily. The victim, while maintained when she exited the store that this other customer, the assailant grabbed her from behind, put a box cutter to her throat, and threw her into
the blue and white sedan and it drove off. Now, after a few minutes, the car stalled, and when the assailant got out to check the engine, allegedly the passenger side door handle was broken off so the victim couldn't get out of the car. The assailant then dragged her to a nearby park where he orally sodomized and raped her and attempted to take her money in cigarettes.
Yes, she said the guy took her money. She says she ran after the guy, and the guy gave her money back. When she claimed that she asked some kids to feed. He didn't say she was going to caught a cop at this time anything. She says she was waiting for a cab. She said the guy came and abducted her again. This time he took her an abandoned building, raped her again, robbed again, and this time he'd cut.
Her in case it wasn't horrible enough, he'd cut her face with a razor to prevent her from identifying. He actually blinded her in one eye, and he told her that if she called the police, he would come back and kill her. She saw his back as he ran away, and then she passed out. But when she came to and regained consciousness, she went to a call box. He used to have these police call boxes around the city,
and she called the police. Let me ask you. She described the victim as five to seven or five eight, one hundred and sixty pounds, with a short afro, had a mustache, but she said she couldn't tell if he was darker light skinned because it was the middle of the night. Obviously it was very dark out, and she told the detective at the hospital that he was physically large and that his name was Willy. Did any of this stuff match up with you?
It didn't match up with me. It wasn't anything that connected me to the crime. I was in Queens that weekend with my fiance, had the ticket steps from going to see Ghostbusters Saturday, and.
Yeah, wow, Ghostbusters. You know, I'm just thinking about that movie was like such a huge thing. It can't It was like the only thing we were talking about that summer of eighty four, which has other implications, specifically that there was no DNA testing back in nineteen eighty four at the hospital. They did do a rape kit and sperm was gathered, but without the DNA testing that eventually
would exonerate you. Alan, all they had was zerology. So, to the best of your knowledge, did they do any testing about blood types at all of this evidence that they had collected.
Not to my knowledge, I didn't find any paperwork. But I have to believe they had an idea because when I got arrested, I went through Rikers Allen and back then they was taking blood from you. But as far as I know, they never did any soology testing, even though they had my blood type and they had a solology evidence that was in the rape kit.
So soroology testing was standard protocol back then in a case like this. If they had something to use against you, I'm sure you know that they would have. But the only evidence from the rape kit that the DAUS was that spermitozoa were present, proving that a sexual interaction had occurred, but nothing about blood types, which is very suspicious. And meanwhile, the detectives brought their mug book down to the hospital and the victim, who had remember just gotten out of
eye surgery, was shown a dizzying amount of pictures. Who knows what was going on during this process as far as the suggestive nature of it or the pressure they put on her when she was in an extremely fragile state. But then eventually she picked out your picture from that arrest back in high school. Then they brought a photo lineup to the store clerk who also picked you.
Out, and even what they have the stalk clerk. The stalk clerk said the reason why she recognized me. This is what she claimed on a stand I was the only guy that I came into the establishment and the last twelve hours that she didn't know.
And again we don't know how suggestive they were being with either of these identifications, and then both of them having already seen your picture. It's not surprising at all that both women picked you out of a live lineup, so you were arrested. But something about this idea and the whole situation should have stuck out to everyone involved. The clerk maintained that the victim knew the assailant, but the victim didn't know you at all, right, I mean, did you know the victim.
Not at all? Never seen her, never met her, never knew right.
Plus you had a solid alibi. Your fiance and her daughter bouch for you. You've got the movie ticket stubs, you had stayed up late watching TV with her family and Queens before spending the night there. I mean, you were in an entirely different borough.
I wasn't in the brongs that weekend. I was in Queens and Bookman. And it gets even better now. When I first got arrested, my fiance, you know, intended father in law. He was a retired correction officer. He went to the Bronx District Attorney's office and said, listen, I don't know what this case is about, but I know this man was at my house in Queen's and they try to ask, well, do we have a key? Do he be coming in three four in the morning. They
was like, listen, he don't move like that. It wasn't no urgency to try to get to the truth, to find out what really happened. And like I said, the victim also told the cops this guy named was some guy named Willy. Later on, I found out that the cops was investigating some guy named Willy, and paperwork that I was able to get years later showed that they
was doing investigation into somebody. Matter of fact, there was a series of rapes going on in the community and it was fitting a similar description, a similar mo and that just stopped.
I mean, it sounds like maybe this guy could have been an informant, or they were protecting him in some way. I don't know, because otherwise, why would anybody want to let a serial rapist remain free. It's insane, but that's what happened, and I can only speculate because I have no idea what was going on behind the scenes. And it's crazy when you talk about your father in law
to be, you know. I mean, this is a guy you would think would have some credibility, you know, in that system especially, And they didn't care what he had to say. They didn't care what you had to say, they didn't care about your fiance. In fact, they were aggressively disinterested, no question. They were fighting against the truth and they won.
They said, when they can't to stand. Well, once we focused on mister Newton, everything else ceased in regards to another suspect. And a lot of these cases, the person that committed these crimes go on to commit multiple crimes. Okay, I'm not caught. They don't stop and like check themselves, right.
And this is a guy who was so depraved that he also took a box cutter to her face. I mean, like this is like, this is a person that we should all want off the streets, you know what I mean. Jesus Christ. This episode is underwritten by global law firm Greenberg Traig through its pro bono program. Greenberg Traig leverages its more than twenty four hundred lawyers across forty two offices to serve the greater good of our communities and provide equal access to justice for all in the field
of criminal justice. Greenberg Triwerg attorneys have exonerated and freedomand in Philadelphia represent numerous individuals previously sentenced to life for crimes committed as juveniles and resentencing hearings, and received the American Bar Association's twenty twenty one Exceptional Service Award for Death Penalty Representation for their work on five death penalty cases. GT is reimagining what big law can be because a more just world only happens by design.
They offered me three years, Jason, they offered me three to ten years in a plea deal, and I couldn't take debt saw. I made a constant decision to go to trial and fight this all the way through.
How long did the trial take?
Five to six days altogether?
So Trialy only used the rate kit and other biological evidence to determine that a sexual act had occurred, but no zerological evidence was presented, So we don't know what
they found out, if anything, at all. And I'd only be speculating to say that since they had identifications from the victim and the witness, they may have ignored or hidden inconvenient exculpatory evidence, like if the blood type didn't match Allen, And of course many years later DNA testing absolutely excluded Allan and proved that these two misidentifications were just that totally unreliable. And that's really all this trial came down to. The two misidentifications.
They had to line up. They had to line up. I was picked out by the victim and this witness. But when they both came to court a year later and saw me again, neither one of them initially picked me out in court, neither one of them, and then the district attorney I was on the case at the time. The ABA had a discussion with the victim and the store clerk, and they both came up with an excuse of why I'm now the guy.
So the only evidence they had was shaky, but somehow that was still enough to overcome your defense. What if anything was presented in your favor.
I mean, not only did my fiance testify, her daughter testified. My fiance also took a lot of detective tests, see passed it. You know, the court was informed, the district attorney was informed about this. And unlike you see on CSI or one of these other law and order shows where okay, somebody passed a lot of detective tests. Let's
try to do a little more research. The only thing the judge did he turned to my fiance while she was on the stand and said, listen, if you say anything about that lie of detective tests, I'm gonna hold you in contempt.
Right, and obviously lie. Detective test results are inadmissible because the testing is super were subjective. But back in nineteen eighty four, polygraph results were still admissible in court. So it's interesting and confusing that this judge seemed keen on keeping that information from the jury, which brings us to
this very odd verdict. You were acquitted of all the charges stemming from the incident at the park, but convicted of the charges related to the victim's attack in the abandoned building, which I had to read that like three times because I was like, but wait a minute, it was known at the time directly from the victim that it was the same person.
Correct, So.
Can you I mean, that's a great question. I just helped me out here because I don't understand I.
Got to answer for that. Remember, now, the victim and the clerk had different testimony in regards to how the victim got into the car. The victim says she was abducted. The clerk says she randomly walked into the call. So the jury submided is that these two people knew each other. And then to hear what the jury told my lawyer about why they made that decision, it was like, oh, yeah, well, they called the girl a liar about being abducted coming
out the store. They went with the store clerk's testimony that she walked into the car on her own, which means they were saying the girl and the guy was together. But we believed something went wrong after the park, so they believed the victim when she says she got assaulted in the building, but they thought she was lying about the park and that came out because she got cut.
If this woman did not get cut, I truly believed I wouldn't got convicted because they attitude was, well, this was a consensual relationship, even though that wasn't the testimony outside of what the clerk said about the guy beeping the horn and the victim walking into the car. So that's called to be pugnant verdict because it's the same victim, it's the same evidence, and a judge legally don't supposed to allow because it's inconsistent.
I mean, the jury was presented with this conflicting evidence, and maybe in the interest of public safety or so, they thought, they were very willing to come up with their own narrative of the events to come to this verdict, which of course isn't what they're supposed to do. They'd accepted the store clerk's testimony, in effect, calling the victim's testimony about not knowing her attacker, they called that a lie. Meanwhile, it was undisputed that she didn't know you at all,
yet she identified you anyway. That means if the store clerk was right, the victim must have been protecting her actual attacker when talking to the police and fingered you in his place. On the other hand, if the store clerk was wrong, maybe she was abducted by a stranger. But then the jury should have believed her about both assaults.
They just chose to believe half of the victim's story about the building, and we don't believe what happened in the park. And they said, well, we're going to go with the store clerk because supposedly she's an independent witness. But it was also testimony from the victim herself, now that she had got assaulted about less than a month before by an ex boyfriend. So it was a lot
of things that came out. But I also believed the judge played a big part in my trial because the ADA in my case was kind of new, fresh out of law school. You know, she wasn't up the park when it came to trying to question witnesses. The judge was taken over across examination and direct examination. It was like you're supposed to be, you know, the arbitrator, not
make the case for the ADA. Unfortunately passed away before my case got overturned, because I would have really liked to show him that I was really innocent.
I'm sure that would have been satisfying. Considering what you're telling us now, and also what we know this judge had already said to your fiance by being held in contempt, it sounds like he was really, for all intents and purposes, just another prosecutor, like an adjunct prosecutor, which obviously totally tilts the scale, and not in your favor at all. So at this point, did you expect the jury would see past the nonsense?
I mean, when you're telling the truth, you believe in your heart, it's gonna stand up. You believe it's enough. It came as a real shot. I wanted to prove my innocence and say, hey, I got the wrong guy here. You know, this can't go on. And I didn't think it was gonna last twenty two years. And I mean I didn't think I was gonna get convicted either. So the first thing I did once I got of state, the first motion I put in the post say motion
was trying to get psylology testing. That's the first motion I put in. I wanted to try to get that rape kit and try to test it, you know, and this was pre DNA. I just want to test it for blood typing. Judge Einstein all through the years when I was founding motions on my behalf, he just he would shoot me down. He just disregarded all my motions. Even I was trying to find the rape kit and presenting you know, the republic verdict, everything got dismissed. And
it was hard, man, you know, it was rough. I lost both my parents in there, and ooh, things that you know that I lost I could never get back. But I had my family and they was, you know, always there for me. And so having that support and had to keep fighting though until I got it right though, until they realized they made a mistake.
And that took unfortunately way too long, as it usually does in these cases.
Ten years after I got convicted, New York State passed the DNA law. I was one of the first people to put in the motion as far as trying to get testing.
On August sixteenth, nineteen ninety four, that was the first time that you requested the post conviction DNA testing, but the court denied your request because they said the kit could not be located.
Because I was going to pro say, the courts allotted DA's office to indicate, well, we can't find it. We did a search, we can't find it. And so my one true hope of proving my innocence in my mind didn't exist anymore, you know, was gone Vanitho.
And that had to be a terrible blow, right, you.
Know, I was almost broken though in you know, no chance of getting out I got to do all this time unless I go say I did something I didn't do to try to make parlole. And I had spoke with you know, my brother about it, my family, and I was like, hey, I may have to go take a program here and say I did this crime just to have consideration, not for release consideration. And my family was like, nah, you're not doing that. I was like,
I'm doing this time. They was like no, we all doing this time with you.
That sounds like a pretty dark time. But fortunately this whole situation turned around and this is the good stuff. So what happened next?
So now, ten years after that, when Innocon's Project come on a case, Vanessa Popkin reached out to the Browns County District Attorney's office and the ADA decided, Okay, you know, we're gonna look for it now because we have an attorney acting us. The relationships the Innocence Project had with the district attorney offices made it possible. I mean, the courts couldn't make the DA's office look for it.
In November two thousand and five, the kit was found after a physical search of the evidence barrels at the Pearson Place Queen's warehouse, which means the rape kit was found in the same barrel that was indicated on the evidence voucher, which is to say, it was where it was supposed to be and where it had almost certainly been all those years that they had been saying they couldn't find it. It was right there.
Now it was supposed to go back to the Bronx. It never went back to the Bronx. They didn't come to pick it up after the trial. And what happened. You know, evidence that's not reclaim is sent to piercing place in Queens and like you said, it was indicated on the voucher that it was sent somewhere else. Now this is the tricky part. If it had got sent back to the Bronx, there's a possibility I wouldn't have
been here. Because the Bronx was losing and destroying stuff, Queens Warehouse was bigger, so they was able to maintain property. Even though they got property in there for fifty years, they was able to maintained it. So technically it wasn't where was supposed to be, but it was where it was indicated to be.
So in April two thousand and six, FSA Forensic Scize Associates attained a full DNA profile from the Daglan cervical swabs. The reference samples were collected from you Allen and FSA and the Bronx DA's office confirmed the DNA drum roll, please, here we go. The DNA conclusively excluded you as the source of the sperm are covered from the victim. Immediately after the rape, justice finally prevailed. It was delayed, but
not denied. It was delayed for twenty two years, and on July sixth of two thousand and six, you walked out of a Bronx courthouse after the instance project and the Bronx County DA's office filed a joint motion to vacate your conviction. I remember this because we were all celebrating. What was that moment like for you?
I was heaving. I was. I was like being born in an I didn't see it coming. I was almost prepared just do the whole forty. That was the attitude I had, because the pre parole board told me I have no chance unless I take responsibility. And so I couldn't see it. And I mean I was walked around like a zombie. I was just you know, being led by my family and you know, I mean the lights and it was the best moment in my life, you know, like getting convicted, you know, twenty two years prior to that,
I didn't see that curveball coming. I didn't really see this curveball coming too, because they told me the evidence was gone. So when they found it, you know, it was like, if it's not tampered with, I know, I'm okay. Let me interject one thing real quick. If it was up to the city, I would have never got exonerated.
We found out during the civil trial the ocmme's office, when they was doing the testing and they was contaminating they own samples, they was not able to come up with a result whether that was my DNA or not because the sample that they had they was contaminating it. So whether it's being done deliberately or you know, just
in competence, it's still being done. And if you can't get access to independent testing, which is what the Innocence Project was able to do, instead of relying on just the ocme's office, you're in a catch twenty two situation because you can only believe the sworn documents that they submit to the court. It's the same way when I was fouling my motions pro say all those years, they were swearing to the court that they did a search and can't find the evidence.
It's terrifying, I mean, it's scary. Enough to think it could get lost. Like even when your evidence was sitting in that warehouse, there could have been a flood, right, there could have been anything, and you would be doomed.
But it wasn't. So when Live six came and they cut a brother loose, like I said, it was like my born day. That's like my second birthday now and I look forward to that day and I cherish it. I appreciate life so much more now because I realized how quick we can have it snatched away from us, just you know, on somebody's accusation, somebody's claim, and you know how we really don't have any rights because that's what it came down to. You know, you're guilty until
you prove your innocence. That's the way the system is now. So it was you know, bittersweet too at the end of the day because I had lost so much, like I said, both my parents. So it was bittersweet.
Forty five years old, you released out into the world. No job. Ir fiance had moved on. I mean, I can't blame her after twenty two years, but you know, you hit the ground running anyway. Scholarship from the Third Good Marshal Fund enabled you to roll and get it bes business administration, right. I remember meeting you back around that time, and we started working as a youth mentor, started dating, even water skiing in the Caribbean, eventually right
and graduating in two thousand and ate it. Of course, you filed civil rights lawsuit and were awarded a lot of money. I don't think there's any amount of money that would be enough to justify the suffering that you went through and your family went through. But the fact is it's nice to see. I mean, unfortunately most exigneries
never get any compensation. It makes me happy to see when somebody like you does at least get that monetary reward so you can, you know, do the things that you want to do.
And I'll get back though, and I try to help that the exonves try to go out there and talk about this issue because I could stay in my you know, man cave and you know, stay depressed and stay focused on the last forty years of my life. But it's more about you know, letting people know there's something beat out there and we could make things better. But we all have to you know, stay you know, vigilant and trying to make this possible.
And I'm glad you're out there doing it. Everything you're doing, it's so important. People need to hear from you. You're including right here, right now on this podcast. So now getting towards the closing of the show, it's called closing arguments, and it works like this. I'm gonna first of all, thank you again for being here and for being such
a beacon of hope and for sharing your story. And then I'm going to kick back in my chair, turn off my microphone, leave my headphones on, and just listen for anything else you want to share with me and our audience.
Thank you, Jason. I appreciate you guys and being able to tell this story. It's a blessing because I think this is, you know, one subject that all sane minds think alike. We should not have innocent people being wrong fee convicted and locked up for anything. If there's any chance and any shred of evidence that proved us, I think, you know, we should move mountains to exonerate, you know, men and women, because you have a lot more woman
now that's being wrongfully convicted also. And and like I said, I think this is one thing that you know, we all agree about. But we just have to be diligent and always reminding, you know, public officials that this is a subject that affects each and every one of us, and each time the opportunity arises, we must help people in these situations, you know, while they in prison trying to prove their innocence, and definitely when we come home, because like you said, I had to hit the ground
running because it wasn't nothing there for me. I had a lot of help, fortunately, and unfortunately, a lot of my you know, felt exonneries don't have that type of help, you know, whether it's you know where they got exalivated
or you know, their family or friends situation. It's so important that you know, we all as a society try to not only prevent this from happening in the future, but when it does, make every opportunity to make these people hold again, you know, make advite they can't go back and obtain what they lost, but moving forward we can all make life better for us.
Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Cliburn, and Kevin Wartis, with research by Lyla Robinson. The music in this production was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction podcast, and on Twitter at wrong Conviction, as well as at Lava for Good. On all three platforms, you can also follow me on both
TikTok and Instagram at it's Jason Flahm. Ravel Conviction is the production of Lava for Good podcast and association with Signal Company Number one