A construction worker who was convicted of a rape that never happened is officially a free man after the judge who had sentenced him to 20 years in prison dismissed all charges — and apologized.
“This court had harsh words for you in imposing sentence” back in October 2006, Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Richard Carruthers told William McCaffrey yesterday.
“I want to convey my personal regret for having participated, albeit unknowingly, in this injustice,” said Carruthers. “Given the startling turn of events, I now retract what I said about you.”
McCaffrey, 33, of The Bronx, spent almost four years behind bars after Biurny Peguero Gonzalez accused him and two pals of raping her at knifepoint on a deserted street back in 2005.
Earlier this year, her guilty conscience got the best of her — and she admitted she had made the entire tale up.
The soft-spoken McCaffrey was released on bail in September after new DNA evidence cast doubt on Gonzalez’s claims and she recanted.
“I’m glad it’s over. I’ve been waiting for this for a long time,” he said yesterday.
Gonzalez pleaded guilty to perjury this week and faces up to seven years in prison.
“She knows she sent an innocent man to prison,” said her lawyer Paul Callan. “She wanted these charges to be dismissed and she’s very happy about it. She’s very happy Mr. McCaffrey is out.”
McCaffrey had testified that he met Gonzalez in front of a restaurant in Inwood in September 2005 and invited her to go to a party with him and some friends. She accepted and was riding in his car when she got into an argument with one of her pals on her cellphone and demanded to be driven to them in The Bronx.
McCaffrey said he did so — and then wound up getting arrested for rape after she blew up at her friends and blamed her behavior on having been “attacked.”
“[Gonzalez] said that once she stated she had been raped and more people became involved, the lie became too big for her to back out of,” prosecutors wrote in court documents.
Based almost solely on her testimony, McCaffrey was convicted.
Gonzales, 27, a mother of two, recanted her story earlier this year after she says she had a spiritual awakening.
She “apparently was undergoing anguish attributable to a guilty conscience,” Carruthers wrote.
Gonzalez is due to be sentenced on Feb. 9.
Before vacating the sentence and tossing out the indictment, Carruthers told McCaffrey, “The court cannot restore lost time. Mr. McCaffrey, I wish you well.”