Ex-Rhode Island cop freed in murder case

PROVIDENCE, R.I., Nov. 7 (UPI) -- A former Rhode Island police detective sentenced to life in prison nearly seven years ago for murdering his mistress was free on Thursday after another man, apparently consumed with guilt, confessed to the crime, prosecutors said.

Jeffrey Hornoff, 40, walked into Providence Superior Court on Wednesday in cuffs and chains, and a half-hour later walked out free of shackles and into the arms of his family and friends.

"I doubt if even Shakespeare could adequately find the words to express how I'm feeling right now," an emotional Hornoff told the gathering, hugging and kissing loved ones.

"I thank God and I thank my family and my friends, both old and new, for supporting me and fighting for me and never giving up on me, even in the darkest times when I thought of giving up myself."

Prosecutors agreed in court that Hornoff had been wrongfully convicted in 1996 of strangling and bludgeoning his girlfriend, Victoria E. Cushman, to death in 1989.

Prosecutors said the man they now believe actually killed Cushman confessed to police last Friday, setting in motion efforts to release Hornoff from prison.

Todd J. Barry, 45, a self-employed carpenter, was charged with second-degree murder and is being held without bond pending further court action.

State Attorney General Sheldon Whitehouse said he at first thought Barry was just a "nut" confessing to a crime, but after interviewing Barry's brother, Whitehouse concluded that Barry was Cushman's killer.

"His description of what took place converged so accurately with the evidence as we knew it to be," Whitehouse said.

Assistant Attorney General Randall White told the judge that Jeffrey Barry confirmed that his brother came home the night of the slaying with "the look of the devil in his eyes, with blood on his hands and arms."

Jeffrey Barry said his brother told him that he had "hurt Vicki," White said.

Whitehouse said Todd Barry, a father of two, apparently was filled with guilt that forced him to face his past.

"Telling his children to tell the truth and to be good became unbearable," Whitehouse said.

Todd Barry, who apparently had dated Cushman in the past, was not initially linked to the death.

Whitehouse said that in his confession, Todd Barry admitted he had climbed the outside of the building where Cushman lived on Aug. 11, 1989, strangled her and then beat her with a fire extinguisher.

At the time, Hornoff was with the police department in Warwick, where Cushman lived. He became a suspect after investigators found a letter in her apartment in which she wrote to Hornoff that she did not want to end their affair.

Hornoff initially denied knowing Cushman, but at his trial prosecutors were able to convince a jury that Hornoff killed the woman to keep his wife from learning about the affair.

Hornoff's ex-wife, Rhonda -- they divorced in 1999 -- was among those celebrating his release at the courthouse, along with their 13-year-old son, who was 8 when his father was sent off to prison.

Hornoff was embraced by his mother, Betty June Hornoff, who cried: "Oh God, you're free! Sweet Jesus, God in heaven."

She told her son, "I needed that hug so bad."

White, who had prosecuted Hornoff, told the judge he was "firmly convinced beyond all doubt" that freeing Hornoff was the right thing to do.

All charges are expected to be officially dismissed against Hornoff at a December hearing.

On the day he was convicted, Hornoff gave his brother David a copper bracelet to hold. David Hornoff slipped it off his wrist Wednesday and handed it to his brother.

"It was something he told me to hang on to for him," David Hornoff said. "Now I'm giving it back to him."

Looking ahead to his future, Hornoff said that he wants to become an advocate for others wrongly convicted of crimes.

"My thoughts go out to Vicki's loved ones and to Mr. Barry's loved ones," he said, "and to the hundreds of innocent people still wrongfully imprisoned across United States."

(Reported by Dave Haskell in Boston.)