According to CBS News, after wrongfully convicting a man for raping her, writer Alice Sebold while she was a student at Syracuse University, New York state has agreed to pay $5.5 million to the man who spent 16 years in prison. Anthony Broadwater was convicted of raping Sebold in 1981. The settlement comes after his conviction was overturned in 2021. The settlement was signed the week of March 20, 2023 by lawyers for Broadwater and New York Attorney General Letitia James.
Broadwater, 62, said in a statement relayed by one of his attorneys, “I appreciate what Attorney General James has done, and I hope and pray that others in my situation can achieve the same measure of justice. We all suffer from destroyed lives.” “Obviously no amount of money can erase the injustices Mr. Broadwater suffered, but the settlement now officially acknowledges them,” Sebold said in a statement released through a spokesperson.
In May 1981, Sebold was raped near campus while she was in her first year at Syracuse. She described the attack and the ensuing prosecution in a memoir titled “Lucky”, published in 1999. The book was pulled from bookshelves across the U.S. during the 2021-22 academic year due to its graphic descriptions of rape and stopped being distributed after a state court judge vacated Broadwater’s conviction. The judge found that the case that led to his initial conviction was flawed. In the memoir, Sebold wrote that she spotted a Black man in the street months after being raped and was sure that he was her attacker. “He was smiling as he approached. He recognized me. It was a stroll in the park to him; he had met an acquaintance on the street,” Sebold wrote. ” ‘Hey, girl,’ he said. ‘Don’t I know you from somewhere?’ ”
Police arrested Broadwater, but Sebold failed to identify him in a police lineup where she picked a different man as her attacker. Despite this, Sebold identified him as her rapist on the witness stand and an expert said microscopic hair analysis tied Broadwater to the scene of the crime. Broadwater was tried and convicted in 1982. The type of analysis that tied him to the scene has seen been deemed junk science by the U.S. Department of Justice. Broadwater was released from prison in 1999, but he still had to register as a sex offender until his conviction was vacated in November 2021.
William J. Fitzpatrick, the current district attorney for Onondaga County, the county that includes Syracuse, joined the motion to vacate the conviction, noting that witness identifications, particularly across racial lines, are often unreliable. Broadwater’s settlement with the state must be approved by a judge before it becomes final. “Anthony Broadwater was convicted for a crime he never committed and was incarcerated despite his innocence. While we cannot undo the wrongs from more than four decades ago, this settlement agreement is a critical step to deliver some semblance of justice to Mr. Broadwater,” James said in an emailed statement.
Sebold apologized to Broadwater in a 2021 statement released to The Associated Press: “40 years ago, as a traumatized 18-year-old rape victim, I chose to put my faith in the American legal system. My goal in 1982 was justice — not to perpetuate injustice. And certainly not to forever, and irreparably, alter a young man’s life by the very crime that had altered mine,” Sebold wrote. “I am grateful that Mr. Broadwater has finally been vindicated, but the fact remains that 40 years ago, he became another young Black man brutalized by our flawed legal system. I will forever be sorry for what was done to him.”
Being accused of crime is nothing to take lightly, especially when it’s a sex crime like in the case of Broadwater. This can leave many people feeling lost, confused, and hopeless, especially when you are wrongfully convicted. If you’ve found yourself in this situation, it is imperative that you get legal help. At Vic Carmody Jr., P.A., we can help you receive the justice you deserve!
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