Man freed from life sentence over possible evidence-tampering
A Bronx man sentenced to life in prison for murdering a 15-year-old boy in 2009 walked out of court a free man Monday amid allegations of evidence-tampering in his case.
The Bronx District Attorney’s Office had lobbied for the freedom of Steven Odiase, 31 — although it said it might eventually retry him.
Odiase and another man were convicted in 2013 of fatally shooting Juan Jerez, a high-school freshman, as the teen was headed to play basketball with his friends in The Bronx. Police said the teen had been involved with neighborhood rivals earlier in the day.
But Jonathan Edelstein, one of Odiase’s three appellate lawyers, said that when his team asked the DA to hand over the files on the case during their review of it, they discovered one of the police reports had been tampered with.
Edelstein said the report had been redacted to delete a witness’s supposed description of Odiase — which didn’t match what he looked like.
“It wasn’t blacked out, it was redacted in a way that was strange. It was more whited out with a computer. It was hard to detect,” Edelstein told The Post.
“The more we worked on this case, the more I became convinced that we were defending an innocent man,” Edelstein said.
Prosecutors were convinced to take another look at the case and decided that the report was questionable enough that Odiase deserved to be freed, at least for now.
Odiase was surrounded by family when his conviction was vacated Monday.
DA spokeswoman Patrice O’Shaughnessy said Odiase is due back in court June 13, giving the office time to re-evaluate the case.
“We still might re-try him,” O’Shaughnessy said. “He was released on his own recognizance, but it’s not the final step.”
His co-defendant, Daikwan Giles, who confessed to the killing, remains behind bars.