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From left, Mia Schand, John Thompson, and Mark Schand

(The Republican/Mark Murray)

SPRINGFIELD - At 50 years old, Mark Schand has just gotten his learner's permit for a driver's license, set up an email address and learned how to send a text message.

He put up the Christmas tree in his family’s Connecticut home, for him a novel and joyous task.

His face glows like holiday lights as he talks about his first Christmas at home in almost three decades.

A year ago, Schand was sitting in state prison, 27 years into a life sentence without the possibility of parole.

Victoria Seymour was 25 in 1986 when she was fatally shot outside the former After Five lounge at Central and Rifle streets in Springfield. Police said she was an innocent bystander, caught in the crossfire of a drug-related robbery and shooting.

Schand was charged in her killing, tried and sentenced, all the while maintaining his innocence.

On Oct. 4 Hampden Superior Court Judge C. Jeffrey Kinder, without opposition from Hampden District Attorney Mark G. Mastroianni, granted Schand a new trial.

Mark Schand at his 1987 murder trial

Schand was released from prison that day at the Hall of Justice here as dozens of family members and friends mobbed him for hugs, kisses and a few words.

On Oct. 16, Mastroianni dropped the murder charge, assuring Schand would remain a free man with no murder conviction on his record.

Mastroianni cited as one reason for his actions newly discovered evidence, presented at the hearing for a new trial by defense lawyers John Thompson and Linda Thompson.

Kinder said he granted the motion for a new trial based on the recanting of an identification of Schand by Anthony Cooke, and new evidence presented by Tracy Fisher, Randy Weaver and Martin Smith that Schand was not at the After Five that night.

Mia Schand, Mark Schand’s wife, had testified at the original trial he was with her at her beauty salon in Hartford where they lived on the night Seymour was shot.

She visited him weekly in prison for 27 years, bringing one or more of his three sons with her.

Mark and Mia Schand sat down for an interview recently at the Thompson’s law office on Main Street here.

Asked what he has been doing since his release, Schand said, “Well, pretty much just trying to catch up and trying to re-aquaint myself with my family in a normal fashion as opposed to in the visitors room setting.”

Schand said he has been doing day-to-day stuff, “nothing spectacular,” although his expression while talking made it clear pretty much everything is spectacular to him right about now.

And for Mia: “I’ll tell you, every day is a better day. Every day just to see Mark be able to talk to the kids and see him in the house because I always pictured that. I always pictured one day he would be here and now he’s here.”

Schand has kept up one element of his prison routine, and that is starting the day with an hour in the gym.

But now he can work out with one or the other of his two adult sons who live nearby.

His current priority is finding work, of any kind.

He has met with a woman from a re-entry program, and she is trying to help him find work.

“The back is still working so I can physically do some labor,” Schand said. “My skills are limited so it's not that I have a plethora of choices I can say give me that or that.”

Schand said he would like someday to own a franchise, and hopes to be connected with a sandwich franchise owner to learn about the business.

Technology changed a lot in 27 years. Schand has a smart phone, and needed a lot of help from his sons to see what communication possibilities it held.

“For the first two weeks after I got the phone, people were texting me and I read the text and I literally called them back,” he said.

His son set up an email address for him for job-seeking purposes.

Schand is the father of Kiele Schand, 28; Mark Schand Jr., 27, and Quinton Schand, 26. He has four grandchildren.

Mia Schand, who works at a salon in Windsor, Conn., near their home, is stepmother to Kiele and Mark Jr. She was pregnant with Quinton when Schand was arrested.

The grandchildren - ages 9, 2 and two at 7 months - are often at the Schand's home.



What is getting to be a familiar question, Schand said, is whether he is angry.

“That’s just an odd question. I think I have targeted anger at certain people. I just don’t know how I would manifest it. I can’t wear it on my sleeve,” he said.

Anger, he said, is just a waste of time he does not have to spare.

Schand said he feels “a little bitterness inside” sometimes but not anger, even though he knows he would be justified in being angry.

Mia Schand said her husband gets the question a lot from people - including people at her workplace who note he doesn’t look angry.

She explains it simply: “He’s a nice guy.”

As for driving, Mia Schand said Mark is doing well.

She said, “The first week I put him on the highway he said, ‘You're sure we need to get on the highway.’”

Schand’s battle has been waged by Linda and John Thompson, the husband and wife veteran lawyers who have been trying to get Schand a new trial for well more than 20 years.

They said prosecutorial misconduct on the part of then-assistant district attorney Francis W. Bloom and former district attorney Matthew J. Ryan Jr. resulted in a false conviction.

About three years ago, Centurion Ministries Inc., an innocence project, became involved in Schand's case. Investigators for Centurion developed what the Thompsons argued was compelling new evidence Schand was innocent.

Richard Hepburn and James C. McClosky, executive director of Centurion Ministries, located and interviewed many of the key living witnesses who testified for the prosecution in the 1987 trial.

They also located five witnesses whom neither the prosecution or defense previously interviewed.

Centurion Ministries, founded in Princeton, N.J., in 1983 by McClosky, has as its purpose to work with lawyers to obtain relief for falsely convicted defendants. It raises and disburses the funds required to meet all legal, investigative and administrative costs.

The Schands can’t stop talking about their gratitude for the Thompsons and Centurion Ministries and now Mark Schand is able to give something back. He recently spoke at a fund-raiser for Centurion Ministries.

Schand has had other speaking engagements.

In November, he was on a panel at Princeton University called “I didn’t do it. A conversation about wrongful convictions.”

It was led by journalism professor Mike McGraw, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist on leave from the Kansas City Star.

Schand also spoke at Harvard University’s Criminal Justice Institute and at the Connecticut Statehouse, and has been invited to speak at Yale University about wrongful conviction.

“If I can stop someone from doing 27 years for something they didn’t do again I’ll definitely do that,” Schand said.