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Report on Central Park Jogger Case

According to Newsday, the reinvestigation into the Central Park Jogger case is complete and the paper has seen the confidential report on the inquiry.

"After more than six months re-investigating the Central Park jogger case, authorities have turned up no new evidence to contradict a serial rapist's claim that he alone committed the crime for which five teens served years in prison."

"In fact, a confidential police report obtained by Newsday concludes that "All forensic evidence used at trial ... [to convict the five] has now been determined to be useless."

The report concludes "a hair found on her clothes and originally thought to be from one of the defendants, has been identified as Reyes' hair. The report says a pubic hair from Reyes was found on the jogger's sock."

"Authorities have not found anything linking Reyes to the bands of youths marauding in Central Park that night, interviews indicate. And nothing solid suggests Reyes, then 18, came upon the jogger before or after she was attacked by the five teens, who were convicted largely by their own incriminating statements."

"Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau said Saturday he has not made up his mind about whether he will consent to overturn the 1990 guilty verdicts, as defense attorneys have requested."

"But if claims continue to hold up, he would go along with the defense motion to vacate," said Morgenthau spokeswoman Barbara Thompson."

"We've tried to locate every single witness," said Morgenthau, who has devoted two prosecutors and two investigators full-time to the case since May, reviewing 15,000 pages of records, scouring physical evidence and checking everyone who has come to visit Reyes in prison. "Nothing, so far."

The hair and blood evidence that was linked to one of the five convicted youths and the jogger turned out not to have been from either.

We may never know all the details of the jogger's brutal assault and rape that evening, but it's become very clear these five youths did not get fair trials and deserve to have their convictions overturned.

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