New York City, its Housing Authority, and the state of New York have agreed to pay $9 million to Danny Colon and Anthony Ortiz, who spent 16 years in prison before their convictions were overturned in 2009. Colon and Ortiz were wrongfully convicted in a 1989 double murder in which a Manhattan prosecutor knowingly used false testimony from a key witness.
In June, New York City agreed to pay $40 million to settle a civil rights lawsuit over the infamous 1989 “Central Park Five” wrongful conviction case. According to Joel B. Rudin, a lawyer for Mr. Colon and Mr. Ortiz, settlement papers should be filed later this month. Rudin encouraged the Manhattan district attorney to follow the lead of the Brooklyn district attorney, Kenneth P. Thompson, who is reinvestigating dozens of questionable convictions from the 1980s and 1990s.
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