WHITE PLAINS, N.Y., Sept. 21 (UPI) -- A man has been freed in White Plains, N.Y., after another man confessed to a killing he was convicted of 16 years ago.
Jeffrey Mark Deskovic, who was 16 when he was convicted of raping, beating and strangling classmate Angela Correa, was freed after semen recovered from Correa's body was found to match another man, who subsequently confessed to the crime, The New York Times reported Thursday.
Deskovic, who said his initial confession was coerced by police, said many officials, including then-district attorney and current Republican nominee for state attorney general Jeanine Pirro, had refused to review his case. It was Pirro's successor, Janet DiFiore, who finally allowed the DNA evidence to be matched against a national database.
"I was supposed to finish my education, to begin a career," Deskovic said Wednesday as he left the Westchester County Courthouse. "The time period to have a family, to spend time with my family, is lost. I lost all my friends. My family has become strangers to me.
"There was a woman who I wanted to marry at the time that I was convicted, and I lost that too," he said. "Given all that, I ask everybody: Would you be angry?"
