{"id":661193,"date":"2026-03-17T04:01:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T04:01:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/661193\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T04:01:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T04:01:16","slug":"nyc-man-freed-after-serving-19-years-of-a-20-to-life-sentence-for-robbery-he-didnt-commit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/661193\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC man freed after serving 19 years of a 20-to-life sentence for robbery he didn’t commit"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Queens man was freed and exonerated after 19 years in prison for a robbery he didn\u2019t commit \u2014 after the Brooklyn district attorney\u2019s office<\/a> found he unwittingly used a money order belonging to the victim to buy a stove for his mother.<\/p>\n

Kenneth Windley, 61, walked out of Brooklyn Supreme Court a free man Monday, after Judge Matthew D\u2019Emic<\/a> ordered his 2007 conviction vacated.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel great! I feel great!\u201d Windley said before leaving the courtroom, later telling reporters, \u201cI didn\u2019t give up, and I kept my determination, my faith, and I had an excellent legal team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Windley, who was serving a 20-to-life sentence, said he plans to spend his newfound freedom with his friends and family, but he\u2019s not ready to go right home.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to celebrate,\u201d he said, adding that he\u2019s looking forward to \u201csome seafood.\u201d<\/p>\n

Windley seemed like the \u201clow-hanging fruit\u201d for cops after an April 1, 2005, mugging in Crown Heights, according to a Conviction Review Unit report<\/a> by DA Eric Gonzalez\u2019s office.<\/p>\n

The 70-year-old victim was walking home when a pair of crooks ambushed him in his building elevator and robbed him of two unsigned money orders, one for $542.77, the other for $9.48.<\/p>\n

That same day, Windley used one of the money orders to buy a $379 stove at a Brownsville appliance store. A month later, police found out that Windley used a driver\u2019s license with his name on it and had the stove sent to his Queens address. He was arrested on robbery charges and, ultimately, convicted at trial.<\/p>\n

But the reality of how Windley got the money order wasn\u2019t so cut and dry.<\/p>\n

Windley, a heroin dealer with a lengthy criminal record, headed to the store with cash that day, ready to buy a stove. Windley was staying with his girlfriend in the Howard Houses, where he kept his drug stashes, and on his way out, he ran into two men.<\/p>\n

He told them where he was headed, and when they asked him if he was paying with cash and they came up with a proposition \u2014 use the\u00a0 money order they had to buy the stove, and they\u2019d cover the tax on the purchase.<\/p>\n

Windley told investigators he was wary, but one of the men assured him the money order was meant for a car insurance bill that his girlfriend had already paid, and he couldn\u2019t \u201ctake it back\u201d because he had no ID.<\/p>\n

So Windley agreed, and the two men accompanied him to the store, convincing the\u00a0 manager to go along with the transaction.<\/p>\n

At the time, Windley only knew the men by their street names, but after his arrest, he managed to find out one of their real names.<\/p>\n

Windley testified in his own defense, and the victim was \u201cvague and confusing\u201d on the stand, according to the report. But the jury didn\u2019t believe Windley and found him guilty on March 1, 2007, of second-degree robbery. Windley was sentenced as a predicate felon.<\/p>\n

What the jury didn\u2019t know, though, was the two robbers Windley described were real people, not a fiction \u2014 and they were actually being prosecuted for a string of similar robberies from April 5, 2005, through Feb. 1, 2006.<\/p>\n

One pleaded guilty to the pattern and was sentenced to 14 years, the other took it to trial and lost, and was sentenced to 40 years.<\/p>\n

The prosecutor handling Windley\u2019s trial didn\u2019t investigate his claims, telling investigators the name of the robber Windley provided was too common. Another prosecutor handling the robbery pattern case was never contacted by anyone involved in Windley\u2019s case.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a case that, you know, was a cautionary tale,\u201d Gonzalez said. \u201cOver the years, this Conviction Review Unit has showed the problem with witness identifications and tunnel vision, and there was a lot of evidence that connected him to the case, but he was steadfastly declaring his innocence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Windley and his family did their own investigations after his conviction to pin down the identity of the two robbers and pressure them to do the right thing and confess, hiring a private investigator to help them. He and his legal team submitted statements to the Conviction Review Unit from both men admitting they committed the robbery and sold him the stolen money order.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a great day for justice, especially for Mr. Windley and his family. He deserves this so much,\u201d Windley\u2019s lawyer, David Shamies, said. \u201cHe was an innocent man who fought for his freedom for 20 years, telling the truth the whole time.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Queens man was freed and exonerated after 19 years in prison for a robbery he didn\u2019t commit…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":661194,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,1121,2451,3059,5295,1370,728,405,403,5294,50,5226,5225,5228,5227,5293,4413,5321,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-661193","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-brooklyn","10":"tag-city","11":"tag-county","12":"tag-crime-and-public-safety","13":"tag-latest-headlines","14":"tag-local-news","15":"tag-new-york","16":"tag-new-york-city","17":"tag-new-york-county","18":"tag-news","19":"tag-newyork","20":"tag-newyorkcity","21":"tag-ny","22":"tag-nyc","23":"tag-nyc-crime","24":"tag-queens","25":"tag-sub-county-region","26":"tag-united-states","27":"tag-united-states-of-america","28":"tag-unitedstates","29":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","30":"tag-us","31":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116242526012318474","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=661193"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661193\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/661194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=661193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=661193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=661193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}