On Friday, Connecticut’s Judiciary Committee met and voted on whether to approve a $5.75 million wrongful incarceration claim for Maceo Troy Streater. The meeting followed a re-examination of Streater’s claim by Claims Commissioner Robert Shea, after the Judiciary Committee questioned the methods used in issuing his recommendation back in February.

“Mr. Streater spent 23 years in Connecticut prisons for a crime he didn’t commit,” said Alexander Taubes, Streater’s attorney. “Commissioner Shea went through all of the evidence — prosecutor reports, transcripts, police reports, affidavits, deposition transcripts and live testimony from three witnesses at a hearing — and reached the conclusions in the decision he has before you. We support that decision, and we ask you to support that decision as well.”

Streater was originally convicted of the 1990 murder of Terrance Gamble in 1993, but received a pardon from the state’s Board of Pardons and Parole in 2022. Streater’s case was originally investigated by since-disgraced detectives Anthony DiLullo and Joseph Greene, two former New Haven police officers who have been implicated in several cases alleging coerced and bribed testimony and the burying and fabrication of evidence. At the last Judiciary Committee hearing in which Streater’s claim was discussed, DiLullo’s ex-wife and former law enforcement partner, Lisa DiLullo, testified in support of Streater’s claim. Streater, who was released in 2017, has maintained his innocence ever since his conviction, and since 2023 has served as a New Haven city alderman for the neighborhoods of Dixwell, Newhallville, and Prospect Hill.

Taubes pointed out that the New Haven Police Department has had 19 convictions overturned on the National Registry of Exonerations. He also told the Committee that Streater’s arrest warrant for the murder of Gamble was issued “just hours after the only person who ever testified” to seeing Streater commit the murder had already told police twice that he hadn’t seen the crime.

“He hadn’t seen anyone at the scene,” said Taubes. “Within hours, one interview with one New Haven police detective changed everything, and that arrest warrant, which omitted the prior non-identifications of Troy, was a pattern that unfortunately existed for a long time in New Haven, Connecticut.”

Streater was tried twice before being convicted of the crime; his first trial ended in a hung jury and his second trial, in 1993, resulted in his conviction. In his first trial, Streater’s brother and then-pastor, Reverend Boise Kimber, testified that he was in church at the time of the murder. Three witnesses testified to seeing Streater commit the murder, but all of them later recanted their testimony after Streater’s conviction.

One witness, Carolyn Cheek, was reported by New Haven police to have told a detective that she heard shots and then saw Streater and a group of other men run to a red car and flee the scene. In court, Cheek first testified that she did not recall giving testimony to the police, and then later testified that detectives hounded her relentlessly for her testimony, ultimately coaching her on what to say in between starting and stopping their recording of the interview. She later admitted that she struggled with drugs at the time and was susceptible to police pressure.

Another witness, Joseph Preston, allegedly gave a statement in which he claimed to have seen the shooting and an argument between Streater and Gamble that preceded it. In the first trial, he claimed to have been too far away to identify the shooter. In the second trial, he said he was only 15 to 20 feet away and identified Streater. Preston later admitted in 1998 that he wasn’t sure what he saw.

Another witness, Donnie Andrews, said he saw Gamble in the moments before the shooting, and in a police interview, told detectives that he saw the argument that led up to the shooting. Andrews, who was only 12-years old at the time of the crime, later said that police pressured him to falsely testify.

After his conviction, Streater first appealed the case in 1994, then filed a habeas petition in 1998. In his habeas petition, the three witnesses each provided statements in which they recanted their original testimony. In 2011, Streater tried another habeas petition, and in 2013, attempted another appeal. All of these attempts were unsuccessful.

Gamble’s mother, Joyce Gamble, testified against the Committee’s approval of the claim. Gamble highlighted the fact that Streater’s attempts to appeal his conviction were denied several times and said that if the claim is granted, she would ask, “Where is the justice?”

“That’s just like, you’re giving money to a person that’s guilty and has been found guilty,” said Gamble. “All I can say is, it’s in your hands. And whatever decision y’all make — lies are lies, the truth is the truth. And if the system falls for lies, well, I’ll say it again; Where is the justice?”

Rep. Craigh Fishbein (R-Wallingford) took issue with the fact that two of the witnesses, Cheek and Andrews, did not actually appear at the first habeas hearing. He also took issue with the fact that after the Judiciary Committee asked Shea to reconsider his recommendation to accept Streater’s claim, Shea didn’t assign the review to another member of his office.

“So, how do I address the question that’s been addressed to me about — procedurally — You coming up with a conclusion, coming to an understanding that perhaps that procedure was not the proper procedure, pulling it back, putting the puzzle pieces together, and coming to the same conclusion?” asked Fishbein.

Shea said that he respected the Commission’s request for a review of the recommendation and the “strong message” it sent to him, and thought it best that he take the responsibility upon himself to review it. He also noted that he came to a different conclusion in another claim that was sent back to him to review, which leads him to feel “very confidently” that he did his job correctly.

“I felt like it was important for me to try to do my job correctly and look at all this stuff,” said Shea. “So, I didn’t even think, Representative, that it should be someone else doing my job for me, respectfully. So that’s why I handled it.

Shea noted that he held an evidentiary hearing for his review of the claim, though he noted that he did not compel any of the three witnesses to testify, which Fishbein also took issue with. Fishbein said if he were Claims Commissioner, he would “not be able to come to the conclusion without looking those people in the eye and reading them.” Shea said he included a statement under oath by Preston in a separate 2024 suit that Streater has filed against the City of New Haven, in which Preston asserts Streater’s innocence.

“If I was in your shoes, quite frankly, I would want Preston before me,” said Fishbein. “I would want to ask Mr. Preston whether or not there’s any deal for him to share in $5.7 million, I would want to ask him that question.”

Sen. Gary Winfield (D-New Haven) said that “in all of these cases, there’s a lot to take into account,” but that he had faith in Shea’s review of the claim.

“I think that you did what the committee actually asked you to do, so I don’t find that as problematic as some others,” said Winfield. “I’m sure we have disagreements about things, but the committee said to you that the issue here is that you didn’t independently find for yourself that you believed that Mr. Streater deserved this, and so you went back and did that. So I think we have to take all of that into account.”

Winfield said that regardless of what the decision is on Streater’s claim, “these are sad days, because they’re bigger than Mr. Streater.” Winfield essentially argued that if New Haven’s law enforcement did not operate in a way that gave credence to public distrust, the board would likely not now have to choose between denying a potentially innocent man money for the decades in which he was wrongfully incarcerated or denying a still grieving family their sense of closure.

“What’s disturbing to me is what it means to have had a system operate the way our system has operated,” said Winfield. “Because folks like Miss Gamble, who’s come here — whatever the truth is, in a sense, they have to rely on what’s already happened because they’ve built a life around that being closure for them. And that’s problematic, because we never had to have a system like this.”

Ultimately, the Commission voted in favor of granting the claim; 30 members voted yay, 10 nay, and one abstained. In order for the $5.75 million to be paid out, it must now be approved by both the state House and Senate, then signed by the Governor.

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