After 26 Years In Prison, Innocent Man Carlos Weeks Walks Free From Brooklyn Court
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - After spending more than 26 years of his life behind bars for a crime he didn't commit, on Thursday 46-year-old Carlos Weeks walked out of the Brooklyn Supreme Court a free man.
In 1995, Weeks was convicted of murdering 21-year-old Frank Davis and seriously wounding a 10-year-old girl in a shooting outside the Tompkins Houses in Bedford-Stuyvesant, reports CBS2's Hazel Sanchez.
He was sentenced to 27 years to life in prison.
On Thursday, Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez' office moved to vacate the murder conviction after the DA's Conviction Review Unit found the key witnesses, two sisters, were not credible.
"I just want to say I'm feeling good and happy to be out," said Weeks. "I hope Gonzalez continues with his Conviction Review Unit work because there's a lot of guys up in there that need it."
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The DA said the women falsely testified they were in their 12th-floor apartment when they witnessed weeks firing a gun outside.
Now one of the women is recanting her story. The other says she doesn't remember anything.
The DA says the sisters lied in hopes of cutting a deal for a family member involved in a separate crime.
"I wish Mr. Weeks a heartfelt good luck," said Gonzalez. "We have to make sure that we continue to root out these miscarriages of justice."
Weeks spent more than half his life in prison, fighting to clear his name.
His attorney and the Legal Aid Society had been working on his case for more than five years and broke the news to him.
"We went up to the prison yesterday to let him know and informed him, and he was obviously very emotional about it," said Week's attorney Craig Cagney.
Today in court, a judge officially vacated weeks' conviction.
His gratitude was genuine and simple, just saying "Thank you."
Gonzalez says while it was great to exonerate Weeks, it was also painful to reach out to the victims' families who have no justice in this case.
