Marty Tankleff Blog

Times Editorial & Newsday Op-Ed on Tankleff Case

There were major opinion pieces in the New York Times and Newsday today. Keep in mind both were written before news broke of the State's investigation into Suffolk County law enforcement's conduct in the Tankleff case.

In "Could Martin Tankleff be the Next Jeffrey Deskovic?" the Times's editorial compares Tankleff to Jeffrey Deskovic, who was recently exonerated of his conviction, which was based on a false confession and the subject of a critical investigative report on Westchester law enforcement.

The Times then addresses DA Thomas Spota's involvement in the case:

"Now that Mr. Tankleff has won another day in court, his case deserves a dispassionate, thorough and honest re-examination. Mr. Tankleff’s defenders insist that this is not possible from the Suffolk County district attorney, Thomas Spota. They are demanding that he hand the case to a special prosecutor. While Mr. Spota had no direct involvement in the Tankleff prosecution, which was tried by his predecessor, he and his office do have multiple connections to some members of the large cast of characters in this convoluted case. A detective who lied to Mr. Tankleff while taking his confession, for example, had been previously defended by Mr. Spota, then a private lawyer, in a corruption investigation, and later when the detective was accused of assault.

"The law can be swift and sure when making a case against a defendant and hustling him off to prison. When it is found to have made grave errors, it must be just as honest and forceful in correcting them. We are counting on Mr. Spota to pursue the fairest case the evidence now supports. Or to back away if — as so many on Mr. Tankleff’s side insist — the evidence just isn’t there."

In an op-ed in Newsday today, "Tankleff Case Needs Special Prosecutor," professor and former prosecutor Bennett Gershman writes that before anything else, a critical question must be addressed:

"Should the Tankleff case continue to be handled by Thomas Spota, the Suffolk County district attorney whose office has prosecuted the case from the beginning? Or should Gov. Eliot Spitzer, pursuant to state law, appoint an independent special prosecutor to evaluate the new evidence objectively and convene a special grand jury to determine whether Tankleff should be tried again or whether murder charges should be brought against others?"

Clearly, for Gershman, it's a rhetorical question:

"The ethical rules, particularly those relating to conflicts of interest, require that Spota be superseded by a special prosecutor. Spota's past associations when he was in private practice with key people connected to the case make it difficult, if not impossible, for him to act independently and objectively, even if he believes he can. His subsequent representation of the detective who had allegedly duped young Tankleff into confessing, and his law partner's representation of the man now frequently alleged to have been the ringleader of the Tankleff murders, make it hard for Spota to distance himself from his past and avoid the appearance of a conflict."

Gershman concludes, "A special prosecutor would not be burdened with these ethical pitfalls and would be able to conduct an independent and objective investigation into who killed the Tankleffs."   

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Now that the SIC's new investigation is public, one looks forward to what Newsday will have to say editorially, or not, and for the Times to weigh in again editorially down the road. The Times's decision to put the SIC probe on the front page was an important statement. (A blurb on A1 is the same as an A1 story, as final story placement is based on multiple considerations, including space, other news, etc.)

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With Marty Tankleff's conviction vacated and the SIC investigation underway, the question people are asking now is: How can Suffolk County law enforcement retry Marty Tankleff while the State is investigating its conduct in Marty's original conviction? A retrial would be a farce set in a hall of mirrors.

Newsday: "Probe of Spota's Handling of Tankleff Intensifies"

Today Newsday followed up on the New York State Investigation Commission's inquiry into the Marty Tankleff case in an article headlined "Probe of Spota's Handling of Tankleff Intensifies." [Note: Newsday has since revised the article's online headline.]

"The State Commission of Investigation is ratcheting up a probe into whether Suffolk County authorities, including District Attorney Thomas Spota, mishandled the Martin Tankleff case, the commission's chairman said yesterday," the story leads. "The commission will issue subpoenas in the next few weeks as investigators take a 'broad look' at the Suffolk police investigation that led to Tankleff's 1990 conviction for killing his parents, Seymour and Arlene Tankleff, and how Spota's office dealt with the surfacing of new witnesses in 2003 who supported Tankleff's claims of innocence, said Alfred Lerner, chairman of the commission."

Lerner told Newsday that in the investigation, to be led by Joseph Kunzeman, a former judge and Nassau County attorney,"we're going to look at the whole thing." Lerner said the commission would issue a report in the next five to six months.

Newsday writes that the probe will "scrutinize the actions of Spota, who wasn't district attorney for Tankleff's prosecution and trial but came under fire for not recusing himself when Tankleff sought a new trial in 2003. Both as a private attorney and as a lawyer for the police union, Spota represented McCready. Spota's former law partners also represented Steuerman's family."

SIC Investigating Tankleff Case

The New York Times breaks the news that the New York State Investigation Commission (SIC) has begun an official investigation into Suffolk County law enforcement's handling of the Tankleff case. The Times reports the investigation began quietly over a year ago, but was kept quiet until now so as not to interfere with Marty's legal appeal. “The S.I.C. is viewing this as a serious and significant investigation. The commission is looking at how Suffolk County handled this case,” said the Times's source.

The SIC is a "sunshine" agency with no direct enforcement powers. However, the article states, "it can refer evidence of crimes to the authorities or propose a special prosecutor — something Mr. Tankleff and his supporters have urged as a means to reopen the case and pursue other suspects."

The Times reports, "The commission is taking special interest in the Tankleff case as a follow-up to its investigation of Suffolk County law enforcement in the 1980s, which found entrenched misconduct among the police and prosecutors. 'This is certainly an outgrowth from the commission’s 1989 report,” said the person associated with officials at the agency.'"

In the 1989 investigation the SIC found "misconduct and mismanagement in homicide investigations and prosecutions," including "over-reliance on confessions," and called Suffolk's confession rate "an astonishingly high figure compared to other jurisdictions, so high, in fact, that in and of itself it provokes skepticism regarding Suffolk County's use of confessions and oral admissions." The report found "[T]he Suffolk County Police Department and District Attorney's Office engaged in and permitted improper practices to occur in homicide prosecutions, including perjury, as well as grossly deficient investigative and management practices. Because of credibility problems with prosecution testimony, including police testimony, and other defects in homicide prosecutions, guilty persons may well have been allowed to go free."

According to today's article, with Marty's appeal complete, the SIC will begin field investigations, including the interviewing of potential witnesses.

“Now they will be intensifying the investigation,” the Times's source said. “They want to find out: was this issue handled appropriately or not by Suffolk County, are there still systemic problems and should anyone be held accountable for the arrest and prosecution of Mr. Tankleff.”

Meanwhile, Marty continues to prepare for a possible retrial. “There is this talk that this is going to go away with some kind of a plea, but I don’t see that happening,” Marty's lawyer Bruce Barket said. “Either the D.A. is going to dismiss it, or it’s going to trial."

Read the 1989 SIC Report online

Read our blog summarizing the 1989 SIC Report

Read Newsday's 1986 series on Suffolk law enforecement corruption

Marty Tankleff is Home

After spending Christmas day giving his things away to other inmates and saying his goodbyes, yesterday Marty was driven downstate to spend the night in the Suffolk County jail. This morning, he was led through a tunnel and into a packed courtroom, where he was released on bond by Judge Stephen L. Braslow, whose decisions were reversed on appeal last Friday. Applause erupted in the courtroom.

The media was everywhere. ABC alone had three satellite trucks. News helicopters were planned but canceled due to wintry weather.

Marty was led back down into the tunnel, and then outside and into the arms of his family. One by one, he hugged them. Then he made this statement to the media:

It’s great to see all of you. Here. Today. If my arrest and conviction was a nightmare, this is a dream come true.

I want to thank everyone who made this possible.

Jay Salpeter, for reading a letter I sent him one day, and then taking it upon himself to go out and solve this case.

My entire, incredible legal team.

The people who have been getting the truth about my case out through the media and the website.

The witnesses who have come forward just because it was the right thing to do.

The appellate judges whose ruling demonstrates they did a thorough review of the case record and acted accordingly.

All my friends and supporters, in Suffolk County and across the nation and literally around the world, for your interest and for making my fight your fight.

Most of all, my family, who have stood by me from day one right up to this moment.

Remember that while I am innocent, I am still accused by the Suffolk County District Attorney of the murder of my parents, and I am awaiting a possible re-trial. I do hope that I can continue to count on everyone’s support as I defend myself once again.

I always had faith this day would come. I look forward to welcoming in the new year with my family.

Happy New Year!

Marty did not answer questions, but his family did. Crying, his aunt Marianne said, "I was as upset when Marty was convicted as I was when I learned my sister was murdered. Now we can mourn my sister properly, because we haven't been able to for 19 years."

As happy as he was, Marty's cousin Ron Falbee said, "This whole case has been one disappointment after the other. There's a lingering anger in there that an innocent man spent 19 years of his life behind bars. I find that unacceptable."

Then the family and Team Tankleff were off to enjoy a welcome-home lunch at the home of the relatives with whom Marty will be staying for now. The media camped on the lawn seemed hungry for more than a story, as they kept asking what Marty was eating. For the record, there was a splendid buffet from one of Marty's favorite local restaurants featuring shrimp, chicken and assorted salads. There were adult beverages. Someone had already bought Marty a cell phone and programmed  a bunch of phone numbers into it. Someone else with a laptop set up an email address for Marty and showed him how to log in. Marty took over the computer and googled the website for the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. Marty's cousin yelled at him to get the hell off the computer already. Marty was home.

Find the latest articles here.

To view Marty's statement as a PDF, click here.

Bail hearing Thursday at 10:00 a.m.

Marty is scheduled to be brought down to Long Island to appear at his bail hearing on Thursday, December 27, at 10:00 a.m., before Suffolk County Judge Stephen Braslow, who presided over Marty's new evidence hearing.

Prosecutors and Marty's attorneys have agreed on bail subject to approval of the court. If the court grants bail, as is hoped, Marty could walk out of the courtroom and go home with his family on Thursday.

The bail hearing will be at the Arthur M. Cromarty Court Complex, 210 Center Drive, Riverhead, NY 11901.

NY Times asks "Who Did It?"

In today's New York Times article "With L.I. Murder Conviction Voided, the Same Old Question: Who Did It?," Bruce Lambert leads off, "The same questions asked nearly two decades ago when Arlene and Seymour Tankleff were slashed and bludgeoned in their waterfront home on Long Island are being asked anew today: Who killed them, and why did the authorities fail to investigate Mr. Tankleff’s embittered business partner, Jerard Steuerman, as a possible suspect?

According to the Times's story, now, as then, the Suffolk DA has no interest in investigating Steuerman, Joey "Guns" Creedon, or anyone else. "That's not going to happen," ADA Leonard Lato told the Times. What will happen, the Suffolk DA's office said, is that they might appeal the ruling, and will retry Marty if the ruling stands.

But, the Times article continues, "Mr. Tankleff’s team says the odds have reversed since the 1990 trial, when the jury took a week to convict, based mainly on the disputed confession. Since then, no new evidence has emerged against Mr. Tankleff." Even DA Thomas Spota agrees. “'It becomes difficult for the prosecution. There's no doubt about that," he told the Times. "Bring it on," Marty's cousin Ron Falbee told the newspaper when asked how he felt about the prospects of a new trial. 

Scott Christianson, an author and former law enforcement official in New York State, told the Times that the Tankleff case requires three steps: "The evidence calls for Mr. Tankleff’s exoneration, prosecution of the other suspects and a formal inquiry into Suffolk law enforcement’s mishandling of the case, he said. 'It’s much more egregious than the Duke University case,' he said, referring to the students who were charged with rape and then exonerated."

The Coverage

The news of the appellate court's ruling, and Marty Tankleff's impending freedom, was on the front page of all the New York papers yesterday. For the first time, Bruce Lambert's excellent coverage of the case appeared on A1 of The New York Times, above the fold, right next to the day's lead story, "9/11 Panel Study Finds That C.I.A. Withheld Tapes."

In "Jailed 17 Years, Long Island Man Gets Second Trial," Lambert writes, "Friday’s decision, a unanimous ruling by a four-judge panel in the Appellate Division of State Supreme Court in Brooklyn, granted a new trial for Mr. Tankleff, who is now 36. It also renewed attention to questions he has raised about police and prosecutorial methods in Suffolk County, where a State investigation found rampant misconduct in the 1980s." The article quoted Barry Scheck of the Innocence Project, who said the case "had all the earmarks of a classic false confession." And Pace law professor and former prosecutor Bennett L. Gershman said, “The big question is what happens now. You have three people walking at liberty — Creedon, Steuerman and Kent — who are potential killers. Is [Suffolk County DA Thomas] Spota going to continue on the case? I don’t see how he can.” Of the appellate ruling, Gershman said, “Finally you have an objective, fair-minded view of this case, which has never happened before.”

A separate piece in the Times on Saturday, "Triumph for an Inmate, and a Persistent Investigator," was a profile on Marty's private investigator, Jay Salpeter, who called Friday, the day of the appellate ruling, "one of the happiest days of my life."

In "Appellate panel overturns Tankleff case conviction," Barry Scheck told Newsday for their cover story, "This is a great day for justice in the state of New York."

In Newsday's companion piece, "'No joy' for prosecutors if case retried," criminal law professor Richard Klein of Touro Law Center said, "Believe me, there's no joy in the DA's office to retry this case. The prosecution is going to have no new evidence. All the new evidence is coming from the defense."

A third piece by Newsday on Saturday, by Zach Dowdy with Michael Amon, was headlined, "About a new trial, Tankleff kin say 'bring it on.'" In the article, Marty's cousin Ron Falbee "said he hopes Suffolk prosecutors decline to retry Tankleff. If they do, however, he said legal momentum and mounting public opinion are also on their side now. 'I think a retrial would be a waste of Suffolk County's money - but bring it on,' he said. 'We feel very confident we have the evidence. It would just add to the farce for them to do it again.'"

The New York Post's cover story, with a huge headline blazing 'FINALLY JUSTICE', led with, "In a bombshell decision, an appellate court yesterday overturned the controversial murder convictions of a Long Island man who has spent 17 years in prison for the grisly slayings of his parents."

The Post's companion piece, "Heat's on 'Boasting' Hoodlum," stated that "several witnesses - including his own son - have testified that Joseph Creedon, of Selden, LI, while publicly denying involvement, has privately boasted about the murders of Arlene and Seymour Tankleff."

In their cover story, Court bounces case of Long Island man jailed 17 years for slaying parents, the Daily News wrote that a four-judge appellate panel "unanimously overturned his conviction and said it's 'probable' a second jury would acquit him because cops tricked him into confessing and his lawyers have uncovered new evidence."

In "Court grants retrial to LI man jailed 17 years in double slaying," the Associated Press, like other news outlets, quoted what might become the most memorable line from the ruling: "It is abhorrent to our sense of justice and fair play to countenance the possibility that someone innocent of a crime may be incarcerated or otherwise punished for a crime which he or she did not commit."

The New York Law Journal, in "Tankleff Conviction Upset, Panel Orders a New Trial," writes, "In a 21-page decision highly critical of Judge Braslow's ruling, the Second Department held Friday in favor of Mr. Tankleff, throwing out the convictions and ordering a new trial." The Law Journal noted that the appellate court considered the County Court's decision a "misapplication of its gatekeeper function relative to the evaluation and admissibility of the proffered new evidence."

Today, in "DA agrees on Tankleff release until new trial," Newsday reports Spota as saying "Martin Tankleff should not spend another day in jail while awaiting a new trial." Spota also told Newsday, regarding whether he thought Marty killed his parents, "I never said that he did or did not." Newsday recounts the conflicts of interest Marty's supporters have "long accused Spota of having," namely, "As a private attorney, Spota represented K. James McCready, the lead homicide detective on the case, in 1993 when he was accused of robbery and assault. McCready was acquitted in a bench trial."

Also today, the Times  did a follow-up entitled, "Detectives’ Interrogation Tricks Under Scrutiny After Court Ruling," writing, "In its ruling on Friday, the appellate court said detectives had 'utilized a ruse' in interviewing Mr. Tankleff. It did not offer an opinion on the validity of the 1988 interrogation. But the ruling did say that the nature of the confession, 'how the confession was obtained' and the quick recanting, combined with circumstantial evidence produced during the last few years that pointed to other suspects, were enough for a new trial."

Finally, in "Overturned conviction leaves a murder mystery," Newsday writes, "Now, with the prospect that Tankleff will be free on bail by Friday, his life hangs in the balance again. His future may depend on this question: Were his parents murdered over a past-due debt owed by a shady business associate?...Defense attorneys implicated Steuerman at Tankleff's trial. Any future trial will surely focus on him, with charges bolstered by several witnesses who say associates of Steuerman's son Todd have privately admitted killing Seymour and Arlene Tankleff."

The Truth is Out There - On the Front Page

The Appellate Court's Ruling

Today the Appellate Court, Second Department, vacated Marty's conviction and ordered his case back to Suffolk County for a retrial "to be conducted with all convenient speed."

"It is abhorrent to our sense of justice and fair play to countenance the possibility that someone innocent of a crime may be incarcerated or otherwise punished for a crime which he or she did not commit," the ruling stated. Judge Reinaldo E. Rivera wrote the ruling, with Judges Gabriel M. Krausman, Anita R. Florio and Mark C. Dillon concurring.

The ruling was based on newly discovered evidence, and not just the quantity and cumulative effect of the over two dozen witnesses who testified to Marty's innocence and others' guilt. It was also the fact that these witnesses were unrelated and so separated by time:

"The County Court completely disregarded a crucial fact which is pivotal to our determination. Namely, many of the witnesses who testified at the CPL 440 hearing were unrelated to each other, and their genesis as witnesses was separated by both space and time. For instance, there is absolutely no connection between Kovacs, Foti, Demps, Fischer, Joseph, and Ram. Notably, although clearly not connected to one another, each of those witnesses implicated Creedon and/or Jerry Steuerman in the Tankleff murders."

One by one, the appellate court rejected the Suffolk County judge's decisions:

"The County Court, in effect, applied a blanket disqualification of all of the defendant's proffered evidence. It viewed almost all of the defendant's witnesses as questionable, untrustworthy, or unreliable. It dismissed, outright, the possibility that witnesses with criminal records, drug addictions, and/or psychiatric issues may nevertheless be capable of testifying truthfully....As noted by my learned colleague, the Honorable Gabriel Krausman, at the oral argument before this Court, the People 'use [such witnesses] all the time'....

"Similarly, the County Court dismissed as incredible the testimony of certain witnesses on the ground that they were biased against Creedon. We cannot conclude that multiple witnesses who admittedly expressed fear of or contempt for Creedon perjured themselves in order to implicate Creedon in the murders....

"On a related topic, we reject the People's assertion, made at the oral argument of the instant appeal, that certain witnesses came forth because this was a highly-publicized case. The claim that intense media coverage somehow played a role in this case and the implication that this prompted individuals to testify falsely is sheer conjecture and speculation."

Finally, while the ruling was based on newly discovered evidence, the appellate court clearly viewed Marty's "confession" as central:

"At the original trial, the defendant's repudiated confession was the most compelling evidence elicited by the prosecution. Arguably, it was the linchpin of the prosecution's case. The Miranda aspects of this case have been extensively litigated and will not be revisited. However, when the evidence presented at the CPL 440 hearing is evaluated against the backdrop of the trial evidence, including the defendant's confession, how the confession was obtained, and the fact that the defendant almost immediately recanted the confession, the newly-discovered evidence is "of such character as to create a probability that had such evidence been received at the trial the verdict would have been more favorable to the defendant."

We're expecting a bail hearing for Marty next week.

Too many people to thank right now. You know who you are. Thank you and happy holidays!

Conviction vacated, new trial ordered!

More to come....