A federal judge has thrown out a civil-rights lawsuit brought by a pair of men who spent 27 years locked away in state prison on a murder rap that a judge later overturned. Earl Truvia and Gregory Bright were convicted in 1976 for the murder a year earlier of Elliot Porter, and both were sentenced to life in prison.
Then-Judge Charles Elloie vacated the convictions in 2002, accusing the district attorney’s office of hiding important facts from the original defense team.
Among those facts, prosecutors apparently failed to reveal the criminal, drug and mental health history of the lone eyewitness, a woman who claimed she saw Bright and Truvia with the victim on the night he was killed.
It turned out she was a paranoid schizophrenic who testified under a false name.
Both men were freed, and eight years ago they sued the Orleans Parish district attorney’s office, seeking $1 million for each year they spent locked away.
Former District Attorneys Harry Connick and Eddie Jordan, along with the New Orleans police department, also were named in the suit, which alleged numerous violations of the men’s constitutional rights.
But on Monday, U.S. District Judge Kurt Engelhardt granted a motion by the city and District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro’s office to toss the case.
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