New York to pay wrongfully imprisoned man $6.25 million

Yamiche Alcindor | USA TODAY

New York City will pay $6.25 million to a man wrongfully imprisoned for 24 years for a murder he didn't commit.

The settlement comes more than 14 months after a judge released Jonathan Fleming, 53, from prison, overturning a 1990 murder conviction and a sentence of life in prison.

"It's a bittersweet moment," Fleming told USA TODAY Tuesday. "On the same day I'm signing this settlement, I'm taking my mother off of life support."

Fleming signed the settlement documents then left for the hospital to be with his ailing mother, who he said may be close to death. His mother, Patricia Fleming, 73, went into cardiac arrest two weeks ago after suffering a heart attack earlier this year, Fleming said. Fleming said doctors have told him his mother now has brain damage.

"When I was in prison, my mother told me she prayed and asked God for her to live long enough to witness me getting out of prison," Fleming said. "When I got out, she told me she asked God to please get some time with me. And, she got that."

Fleming said he is grateful for the 14 months he got with his mother. He also said he's pleased with the settlement and plans to give his family a better life.

"Today was a day of great joy and great sadness for Jonathan Fleming," his attorneys, Paul Callan and Martin Edelman, said in a statement.

Fleming "spent nearly half of his life behind bars for a crime that evidence available at the time proved he could not have committed," New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer said in statement announcing the settlement on Tuesday. "We cannot give back the time that he served, but the City of New York can offer Jonathan Fleming this compensation for the injustice that was committed against him."

Fleming has struggled financially since his release from prison on April 8, 2014. He lives with his ex-wife and depends on donated and borrowed money.

"Being locked up in a cage for something that you didn't do — no one should ever have to experience that," Fleming told USA Today just before the settlement. "And I feel that I should have been compensated with something, with all these years that was taken away from me."

Wrongfully convicted man finds tough life on the outside Jonathan Fleming spent 24 years in prison before a missing receipt proved he was in Disney World at the time of a murder in Brooklyn.

Fleming is also seeking $25 million from New York state. Since 2000, the state has paid out more than $85 million to settle 66 wrongful conviction lawsuits, state records show.

"Now that the city has settled, I'm hoping the state will do the right thing," Fleming said.

Prosecutors charged Fleming with the Aug. 15, 1989 shooting death of his friend, Darryl Alston, someone he had known since their childhood in Bedford-Stuyvesant's Marcy Projects public housing. Fleming told police he was in Orlando at the time of the murder, celebrating his son's 9th birthday with a trip to Disney World. A jury convicted Fleming of second-degree murder on July 20, 1990. A judge sentenced him to 25 years to life in prison.

While in prison, Fleming hired private investigators Bob Rahn and Kim Anklin to look into his case. The investigators and Fleming's lawyers persuaded the Brooklyn prosecutor's office to review the case. The office found a receipt in Fleming's file in November 2013 that indicated he was in Orlando at the time of the crime. To this day, it is unclear who took the receipt or why it remained buried in his case file for decades.

"Jonathan Fleming was clearly wrongfully convicted and spent nearly 25 years of his life imprisoned unjustly," Brooklyn District Attorney Ken Thompson said. "No amount of money will ever give him back that time."