Brooklyn defendant, wrongly convicted of murder, released after 23 years
Eastern District Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis on Friday announced the release of William Lopez, a prisoner wrongly charged and subsequently convicted of a 1989 robbery and murder.
Garaufis chided the prosecutors, the original presiding State Supreme Court justice and the defense attorneys. “The case of William Lopez was rotten from day one,” Garaufis wrote in his order to release Lopez.
In 1989, someone shot and killed Elvrin Surria, a known drug dealer, in a crack house on Brighton Fifth Street in Brooklyn. Lopez was charged for this crime and convicted, and was then sentenced to a prison term of twenty-five years to life.