BUFFALO, N.Y., July 12 (UPI) -- A man sentenced to 25 years in New York for manslaughter has been granted his release because he was convicted after the statute of limitations expired.
Alan Tomaski's conviction was set aside earlier this week, The Buffalo (N.Y.) News reported.
He was acquitted last year of the murder of Samuel Ciapa, but jurors convicted him of manslaughter.
Murder has no limit on prosecution, but manslaughter charges in New York must be brought within five years.
Ciapa was beaten and stabbed in 2002 in what police said was an act of revenge. Investigators say Ciapa, Tomaski and Michael Hesse, who was sentenced to 17 years after pleading guilty, were involved in drug dealing, and Tomaski believed Ciapa had stolen a pound of marijuana.
James Bargnesi, who prosecuted Tomaski, asked the judge during last year's trial to allow jurors to consider manslaughter. Defense lawyers did not raise the statute of limitations, and the prosecutor and Judge Russell Buscaglia apparently did not consider the implications of the charge either.
Tomaski himself raised the issue with his lawyers after his imprisonment when he learned of a similar case.
"The evidence against him was so overwhelming," Marcia Ciapa, Samuel Ciapa's mother, said. "I don't want to know about a technicality. I don't know how I'm supposed to act or think. I'm in shock. I just want to scream."
