Whoops! Brooklyn prosecutors admit wrong man identified in videotaped assault, charges dismissed

December 11, 2014 By Charisma L. Troiano, Esq. Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Brooklyn attorney Ken Montgomery pointed to a height discrepancy in police-obtained video, clearing his client, Elijah Green, who had been wrongly accused of attacking a pregnant woman and killing her 7-month-old fetus. Photo via kjmontgomerylaw.com

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A Brooklyn man can rest easy now that he has been cleared of assault charges after his lawyer noticed a discrepancy in the videoed assault. This case calls into question the reliability of eyewitness identifications, emboldens the demand for police body cameras and points to a definite change of the guard in the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office.

Video surveillance footage shows the March attack of pregnant woman Mia Jones by two men with tightly tied gray hoodies. Jones identified Elijah Green as the man holding her while Jones’ boyfriend, Torey Branch, repeatedly hit her in her stomach, killing her 7-month-old fetus.

Based on the victim’s account and identification, Green was arrested on assault charges. Facing 25 years behind bars, Green made a terrified visit to attorney Kenneth Montgomery’s law office on Rogers Avenue in the Prospect-Lefferts neighborhood in Brooklyn.

“We received the footage in the original case file from the District Attorney’s Office, and on first view, I knew something was wrong,” Montgomery told the Eagle. “You could tell immediately that it wasn’t Mr. Green in the video.”

Prosecutors identified the man in the video as being 5-foot-7, but Green stands at a height much taller.

“My client is 6’ 1’’ with an athletic build,” Montgomery noted.

Armed with what he perceived as exonerating evidence supported by a forensic video expert, Montgomery approached Brooklyn prosecutors, who admitted that the information was compelling.

“We had Elijah come in to be measured,” said Brooklyn Assistant District Attorney Joanna Malikouzakis. “Elijah was measured to be 5-foot-11 without shoes and 6-foot-1 with Timberland boots on,” the prosecutor said, conceding that Green was not the assailant in the footage.

“All you have to do is look at this video and look at him,” Montgomery responded.

The indictment against Green has been dismissed and amended to name Branch and “an unapprehended other,” officials report.

“I feel good,” Green told the New York Post. “I knew I was innocent.”

Green had been out on bond since his arrest in April.

Although it took a series of motions and a presentation in front of a Brooklyn judge to clear his client’s name, Montgomery places little blame on the Brooklyn D.A.’s Office.

“The problem was that the assigned detective on Mr. Green’s case was fired,” Montgomery asserts. “They should have done a more thorough investigation.”

Montgomery noted that the detective who investigated the case was fired in May — for accidentally shooting his partner in the hand after a supposed night of drinking.

“The video was in the original police file. But the NYPD is so confident locking up people of color and letting the D.A. sort it out.” Montgomery told the Post.

Green and his attorney are preparing a civil suit against the city for false imprisonment. “A civil case is likely pending here,” Montgomery confirmed to Eagle. “If the government, the NYPD, had the same information on the video as to the suspect’s height before they arrested Mr. Green, then there is a good claim for false arrest.”

A Case of Police Body Cameras

“I cannot explain how terrifying it is for a client, who knows he’s innocent, but police investigators and prosecutors have already begun building a case on his supposed guilt,” Montgomery said.

Brooklyn has joined the nation in its demand for body-worn cameras on police officers after incidents including no-bill grand jury indictments in the deaths of Staten Island resident Eric Garner, an unarmed black man seen via cellphone video footage being placed in a deadly chokehold by white police officer Daniel Pantaleo; the shooting death of unarmed-teen Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri; and numerous other bystander footage showing purported acts of police brutality.

“In Staten Island, an unarmed man was killed by policemen arresting him for trafficking in untaxed cigarettes, and in Ferguson, Missouri, an unarmed teenager was shot six times and killed by police officers,” said New York federal Judge Shira Scheindlin. “If the police in both of those encounters had been wearing body cameras, I expect that neither incident would have ended with a dead body.”

In August, Public Advocate Lettita James released a report showing that requiring officers to wear body cameras would not only provide a fuller context of contested police encounters and bring clarity in cases of police-involved shootings, but will also save the city money in police abuse lawsuit settlements.

Select police precincts — including Brooklyn’s 75th — have begun training with body-worn cameras as part of the new pilot program recommended by James’ report.

“There will be an officer working all hours of the day, every day, wearing a body camera,” said Inspector Michael Lipetri at a recent 75th Precinct community meeting earlier this month. “It’s going to start out small, probably just one officer per shift; there has to be a lot of data stored, and they have to figure things out.”

“I’m so thankful that we had surveillance footage in Green’s case,” said attorney Montgomery. “If a picture is worth a thousand words, what is a video worth?”