Exonerated man ‘framed’ for baby’s homicide spent nearly 30 years in prison, suit says

Adam Carmon has spent over half of his life, nearly 30 years, imprisoned for the killing of a baby girl in New Haven, Connecticut.

But ever since the death of 7-month-old Danielle Taft — killed in a shooting that left her grandmother paralyzed on Feb. 3, 1994 — Carmon has maintained his innocence.

At a state trial in 1995, he was convicted in the infant’s homicide and sentenced to 85 years in prison. His conviction, however, came despite a lack of motive and forensic evidence, including fingerprints and DNA, linking him to the crime, according to a federal lawsuit filed July 17.

After 28 years and 10 months in prison, a Connecticut court exonerated Carmon, now 51, in June by dismissing all charges against him, according to Kaufman Lieb Lebowitz & Frick law firm, which represents him. His exoneration came after his conviction was overturned in November.

Now, Carmon is suing the City of New Haven and six former New Haven police officers, accusing them of violating his civil rights under the U.S. Constitution by faking evidence and hiding evidence in favor of him, resulting in his lengthy prison sentence.

“I was framed for a child’s murder of which I was innocent,” Carmon said in a statement provided to McClatchy News by Doug Lieb, one of his attorneys. “I can never get back the almost 30 years that were taken from me.”

McClatchy News contacted the city’s police department for comment on July 18 and didn’t receive an immediate response.

Patricia King, corporation counsel for the City of New Haven, told McClatchy News in a statement that “while the city cannot comment on the specifics of this case and the related 1994 incident due to pending litigation, the city is committed to cooperating with all parties and appropriately engaging in the civil litigation process to ensure there are reasonable resolutions on matters where city employees are deemed legally responsible for wrongful convictions or miscarriages of justice in the past.”

With his lawsuit, Carmon is demanding a jury trial after Connecticut Superior Court Judge Jon Alander ruled in November that the New Haven police investigation leading to his conviction was “fundamentally flawed,” according to the complaint.

He is seeking relief, including compensatory damages and punitive damages to be determined at trial.

The 1994 shooting death of baby Danielle

The evening of Feb. 3, 1994, at least 15 shots were fired into a family’s living room of their ground floor apartment in New Haven, according to the complaint.

The gunfire killed baby Danielle and paralyzed her grandmother, Charlean Troutman, the complaint says.

Troutman told police she was peering out the window awaiting the arrival of a taxi when she saw an individual wearing a ski mask before they opened fire, according to the complaint, which says she was unable to identify the shooter.

‘Flawed’ police investigation follows

Police said they soon learned Troutman and her son owed money to an 18-year-old drug dealer, who was interviewed by law enforcement and made recorded statements “implicating himself in the homicide,” the complaint says.

He sold drugs for another man, who previously instructed him to collect the money from Troutman and her son, according to the complaint.

The 18-year-old admitted he met with this man the evening of the shooting and they drove to the apartment where shots were fired, the complaint says.

The other man ultimately denied his involvement in the crime, was let go by police and “received such favorable treatment at least in part because he was a law enforcement informant,” the complaint says.

In citing new evidence and vacating Carmon’s conviction by issuing a 51-page ruling on Nov. 30, Alander wrote “suppressed exculpatory evidence supports a third-party culpability claim” that the two accused drug dealers “were responsible” for the shooting, according to the National Registry of Exonerations. The registry is a project of the University of California Irvine Newkirk Center for Science & Society, the University of Michigan Law School and Michigan State University College of Law.

During the police investigation, officers turned their attention to a 9mm firearm found at a separate crime scene that occurred near the shooting, the complaint says.

The lawsuit accuses New Haven police of faking evidence to link Carmon to this weapon, which investigators argued was used in the shooting.

Additionally, police are accused of hiding “evidence contradicting a key eyewitness identification of Mr. Carmon, undermining its identification of the purported murder weapon, and corroborating another person’s confession to the crime,” according to the statement from Kaufman Lieb Lebowitz & Frick.

Carmon’s wrongful conviction and time in prison

Following an “unfair” trial beginning in March 1995, Carmon was wrongfully convicted at the age of 22 in baby Danielle’s death, according to the complaint.

During his incarceration, he missed his child’s birth, his father’s death and became a target of violence over being linked to the killing of a baby, the complaint says.

He experienced “severe emotional pain and distress” as a result, according to the complaint.

Despite challenges faced in prison, Carmon never wavered in asserting his innocence, the complaint says.

In a statement, he said he believes his lawsuit “is the first step toward making sure the people who caused this nightmare are held accountable in some small way.”

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