Metro

Caroline Kennedy’s jury acquits accused drug dealer

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(Steven Hirsch)

OFF THE HOOK: Career crook Nelson Chatman (inset) was acquitted of selling crack by a jury that included Caroline Kennedy (above), outside court yesterday. (
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An accused crack dealer is singing “Sweet Caroline” today.

Former First Daughter Caroline Kennedy and her fellow jurors took just over an hour yesterday to acquit the Harlem man of charges that he sold four “nickel bag” crack rocks at $5 each to an undercover officer.

Violent predicate felon Nelson Chatman, 31, smiled as the jury foreman rendered the verdict in the 2011 case after 75 minutes of deliberations.

And Kennedy, 55, also smiled, slightly and politely, as jurors were individually asked by a clerk, “Is that your verdict?”

“Yes,” Kennedy said when it was her turn,

The lawyer and philanthropist had sallied forth amiably through her duty since her selection as juror No. 7 a week ago, enjoying lunches and hallway chats with her fellow panelists during down time.

She left the courthouse looking blue-jeans chic in boots and a Prada satchel, declining to talk to reporters.

The good news for Chatman, a veteran drug dealer and thief, is that he has now dodged a mandatory minimum prison sentence of six years on the single charge against him, felony criminal sale of a controlled substance.

But the bad news was he could not be released immediately due to an outstanding parole warrant involving his most recent conviction and prison stint, also for criminal sale of a controlled substance.

Chatman’s court-appointed lawyer, Mark Jankowitz, had insisted in closing arguments that his client had gotten swept up in a crack-cocaine buy-and-bust operation due to a combination of mistaken identity and being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Cops never saw Chatman hand drugs to an alleged steerer, and he had no drugs or prerecorded buy money on him when he was apprehended after a lengthy chase.