December 12, 2022
After winning appellate reversal of first-degree rape conviction, firm gets case dismissed with prejudice
A Queens judge has granted our firm’s motion to dismiss the rape indictment of our client, John King, with prejudice, because the Queens District Attorney violated Mr. King’s constitutional right to a speedy trial and because of prosecutorial misconduct in the grand jury. (We previously won the appellate reversal of Mr. King’s conviction after he had served about five years in state prison. Read our appellate brief here. Read the Appellate Division’s decision, People v. King, 192 A.D.3d 1140 (2d Dep’t), here.)
It is exceedingly rare for a New York court to find a violation of the constitutional right to a speedy trial. However, in this case, the court found that the prosecution committed such a violation by waiting nearly five years to indict Mr. King. As a result of this ruling, the prosecution may not seek to prosecute Mr. King again.
Equally remarkably, Justice Gary F. Miret, a former Queens prosecutor, dismissed the indictment because the grand-jury prosecutor—the current chief of the Queens DA’s Special Victims Bureau—had impaired the integrity of the grand jury by knowingly presenting false DNA testimony and concealing that the complainant had initially recanted her accusations. The court further found that both the grand-jury and trial prosecutors, whom it named, had “failed in their duty of fair dealing to the accused and of candor to the motion and trial courts by failing to disclose” the falsity of the DNA testimony.
You can read the entire decision dismissing the indictment here.
Our law firm has previously won five seven-figure civil rights settlements against the City of New York due to misconduct by Queens prosecutors (see here, here, and here), and has succeeded in overturning several felony convictions on appeal or through CPL 440.10 motions due to evidence-withholding and other prosecutorial misconduct.
Jacob “Coby” Loup authored the legal briefs on appeal and at the trial court level that won Mr. King his two victories. The appeal was argued by firm principal Joel B. Rudin.