Central Park rape convictions may fall

D.A. cites new confession, DNA tests

? Citing DNA on a sock, prosecutors asked a judge Thursday to throw out the convictions of five young men found guilty of beating and gang-raping a jogger during a 1989 “wilding” spree in Central Park that exposed the city’s deep racial divide to the rest of the nation.

Dist. Atty. Robert Morgenthau’s recommendation came 11 months after a convicted rapist who had never before come under suspicion in the case confessed. Also, DNA tests confirmed that his semen was on one of the socks the victim was wearing 13 years ago.

Morgenthau stopped short of declaring the five innocent but said the confession and the tests created “a probability that the verdicts would have been more favorable to the defendants.” And he said no purpose would be served by retrying them.

The decision of whether to throw out the convictions rests with state Justice Charles Tejada, who is expected to rule by Feb. 6.

The attack on a white 28-year-old investment banker, allegedly by a gang of black and Hispanic boys from Harlem, became emblematic of New York City’s struggles with crime and race relations in the late 1980s.

The five defendants are now mostly in their late 20s and have completed prison terms ranging from six years to 11 1/2 years for the crime. But throwing out of their convictions could clear the way for them to sue the city and would free them from having to register as sex offenders for the rest of their lives.

The confession came from Matias Reyes, 31, who is serving a life sentence for raping three women near Central Park and raping and killing a pregnant woman. He said he broke his long silence after finding religion.

Reyes told investigators he raped the jogger. DNA test results returned in May corroborated his story.