Thomas L. Goldstein was convicted of a 1979 murder and spent 24 years in prison for a crime that he claims that he did not commit. The murder conviction came after a jailhouse informant testified that Thomas Goldstein had confessed to the murder when they were in the Long Beach Jail together.
According to the Los Angeles Times, a federal judge overturned the murder conviction 24 years later in 2004, after the credibility of the informant's testimony was called into question. It turns out that lawyers representing Thomas Goldstein claimed that the informant was promised leniency in a grand theft conviction if he testified against Thomas Goldstein.
It's a good thing that Thomas Goldstein had Los Angeles criminal defense attorneys that were committed to appealing his conviction, even after years of time already spent in prison. And don't worry, Thomas Goldstein isn't walking away with nothing in his wrongful conviction case.
The man reached a $7.95 million settlement from the City of Long Beach after suing the city's police for withholding evidence in his 1980 murder trial. The lawsuit also alleged that Los Angeles County officials regularly used the testimony of jailhouse informants without ensuring they were telling the truth.
"The information the authorities suppressed would have led to his acquittal," Thomas Goldstein's attorney told the Los Angeles Times. "Their conduct resulted in Tom spending 24 years in prison, years he can never recover."
This nearly $8 million settlement is the largest pretrial settlement ever in California for a wrongful conviction case, and marks one of the largest wrongful conviction settlements in all of U.S. history.
Related Resources:
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Long Beach, CA Wrongful Conviction Suit Settles for $8M (FindLaw's Decided Blog)
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