Åklagare kallar Central Park Five-serien för fabricering

The Central Park jogger case was a criminal case based on the assault and rape of Trisha Meili, a white woman who was jogging in the park, and attacks on eight other persons in the North Woods of Manhattan's Central Park on the night of April 19, 1989. The attack on Meili resulted in her being in a coma for 12 days. Meili was a 28-year-old investment banker. The next year The New York Times described the attack on her as "one of the most widely publicized crimes of the 1980s".Attacks in Central Park that night were allegedly committed by around 30 teenagers, and police attempted to apprehend suspects. Four African American teenagers and one Hispanic American teenager were taken into custody. After lengthy interrogations, the five teenagers were tried variously on charges of assault, robbery, riot, rape, sexual abuse, and attempted murder relating to the attack on Meili and others. Their prosecution was based primarily on confessions which they made during police interrogations, which in some cases proceeded without parents or counsel present. They each later withdrew these confessions, pleaded not guilty, and refused plea deals. DNA from semen samples found on, and close to the victim, did not match any of the accused, a fact which became known during the first trial. The five teenagers were convicted in 1990 by juries in two separate trials: three were tried in one trial and two in the other. Subsequently known as the Central Park Five, they received sentences ranging from 5 to 15 years. Four of the convictions were appealed, and the convictions were affirmed by appellate courts. The defendants served between 6 and 13 years in prison. Five other defendants were convicted for assaults or crimes against other victims that night.In 2001, Matias Reyes, a convicted murderer and serial rapist who was in prison, confessed to raping the jogger. His DNA matched samples found on and near the rape victim, and there was other confirmatory evidence. He said he committed the rape alone. At the time of his confession, Reyes was already serving a life sentence for other crimes. He was not prosecuted for raping Meili, because the statute of limitations had passed by the time he confessed. In 2002, Robert Morgenthau, District Attorney for New York County, recommended that the convictions of the five men related to charges for the assault and rape of Meili and the attacks on others, be vacated. In this legal position, the parties are treated as though no trial has taken place. Their convictions were vacated in 2002, and the state withdrew all charges against them. In 2003 the five exonerated men sued New York City for malicious prosecution, racial discrimination, and emotional distress. Under Mayor Michael Bloomberg, the city refused to settle the suits for a decade, because the city's lawyers believed that the city could win a court case. After Bill de Blasio was elected as mayor, he supported settling the case; the city settled with the five plaintiffs for $41 million in 2014. As of December 2014, the five men were pursuing an additional $52 million in damages from New York State in the New York Court of Claims.