Martin H. Tankleff (born August 29, 1971) is an American man who was wrongly convicted of murdering his parents, Seymour and Arlene Tankleff, on September 7, 1988, when he was 17 years old. After serving almost 18 years of imprisonment, his conviction was vacated and he was released from prison in 2007. He is now an attorney.

Trial, conviction and sentencing

Tankleff was convicted of killing his parents, Seymour and Arlene Tankleff, on June 28, 1990, and sentenced to two consecutive terms of 25 years to life in prison. In December 1993, the divided

New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York is the intermediate appellate court in New York State. The state is geographically divided into four judicial departments of the Appellate Division. The full title of each is, u ...

affirmed Tankleff's conviction. Tankleff was admitted to the New York State Department of Correctional Services in October 1990. In state custody, Tankleff was incarcerated at the

Clinton Correctional Facility Clinton Correctional Facility is a New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision maximum security state prison for men located in the Village of Dannemora, New York. The prison is sometimes colloquially referred to as Danne ...

in Dannemora, New York, in a special housing unit called "APPU" for high-profile inmates and inmates at high risk of victimization. In January 1997, federal district Judge Thomas Collier Platt Jr. denied Tankleff's petition for a writ of ''

habeas corpus ''Habeas corpus'' (; from Medieval Latin, ) is a legal procedure invoking the jurisdiction of a court to review the unlawful detention or imprisonment of an individual, and request the individual's custodian (usually a prison official) to ...

''. In January 1998, that judgment was affirmed by the

United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (in case citations, 2d Cir.) is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals. Its territory covers the states of Connecticut, New York (state), New York, and Vermont, and it has ap ...

, with Judge

Guido Calabresi Guido Calabresi (born October 18, 1932) is an Italian-born American jurist who serves as a senior circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He is a former Dean of Yale Law School, where he has been a professor s ...

writing for the unanimous panel. In an appeal 12 years later, his lawyers presented new evidence and witnesses.

Appeals and exoneration

His lawyers mounted appeals of his conviction. A 2003 appeal hearing presented new evidence from 20 witnesses who named his father's business partner as having planned, executed, and bragged about the murder. In December 2007, the New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division unanimously vacated Tankleff's conviction and sentence. An appellate court ultimately overturned his conviction in 2008, after Tankleff had served 17 years in prison. Tankleff was represented by attorney Barry Pollack. Before the Suffolk County District Attorney dropped the charges, New York Governor

Eliot Spitzer Eliot Laurence Spitzer (born June 10, 1959) is an American politician and attorney who served as the 54th governor of New York from 2007 until his resignation in 2008 after a prostitution scandal. A member of the Democratic Party, he was also ...

appointed New York Attorney General

Andrew Cuomo Andrew Mark Cuomo ( , ; born December 6, 1957) is an American politician and lawyer who served as the 56th governor of New York from 2011 until his resignation in 2021. A member of the Democratic Party and son of former governor Mario Cuomo, ...

as special prosecutor in the case. From his staff, Cuomo selected Chief Trial Counsel Benjamin Rosenberg and veteran homicide prosecutor Thomas Schellhammer to re-investigate the case. With the investigation completed, on June 16, 2008, Rosenberg said to Justice Doyle, "The issue in this case is not whether there is evidence, but whether there is sufficient evidence." Rosenberg announced: "The people move to dismiss the indictment." In the same motion, prosecutors announced they would not proceed against suspects identified by Tankleff's defense team, revealing that, "on balance, the defense theory does not appear to be supported by clear evidence." On July 22, 2008, Justice Doyle concurred with the Attorney General's motion to dismiss. All charges facing Tankleff were dropped; he would not face retrial.

Suit and settlement

Tankleff filed a civil suit against the state for his wrongful conviction and emotional distress. On January 7, 2014, Tankleff was awarded $13.4 million from the state as settlement of the lawsuit. By that time, Tankleff was in his last semester of law school. He graduated from the Touro Law Center on May 25, 2014. In April 2017, he passed the New York State bar exam. Tankleff had dismissed one of his New York attorneys over personal differences. This attorney persistently sent demands for money to Tankleff and was eventually convicted of harassment.

Federal case

Tankleff and new attorneys appeared before the U.S. District Court, the Eastern District of New York in

Central Islip, New York Central Islip (also known locally by its initials as CI) is a Hamlet (New York), hamlet and census-designated place (CDP) within the Town of Islip, New York, Islip in Suffolk County, New York, Suffolk County, New York (state), New York, United St ...

for a hearing on October 30, 2017. He sued Suffolk County, in addition to various people who were police and county employees at the time of his arrest and trial. Tankleff was represented by

Barry Scheck Barry Charles Scheck (born September 19, 1949) is an American attorney and legal scholar. He received national media attention while serving on O. J. Simpson's defense team, collectively dubbed the "Dream Team (law), Dream Team", helping to win ...

of the

Innocence Project Innocence Project, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit legal organization that works to exonerate the wrongly convicted through DNA testing and other forms of post-conviction relief, as well as advocates for criminal justice reform to prevent futur ...

in Manhattan. In April 2018, Tankleff reached a settlement with Suffolk County for $10 million.

References

External links

Martin Tankleff gets more than $3.3 million settlement from New York state

New York State Investigation Commission

Wrongfully convicted of murdering my parents
(27 min.) from

Outlook (radio programme) ''Outlook'' is a radio programme on BBC World Service that broadcasts human interest stories from across the globe. It broadcasts from Monday to Friday from 1206 to 1250 Greenwich Mean Time, GMT. History This programme was first broadcast on 4 ...

on the

BBC World Service The BBC World Service is a British Public broadcasting, public service broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC. It is the world's largest external broadcaster in terms of reception area, language selection and audience reach. It broadcas ...