If forgiving is divine, then this guy’s a real saint!
A white Brooklyn man who has spent 14 years behind bars for killing a black man because a judge used reverse racism to find him guilty of murder said he holds no anger toward the former jurist — and even complimented the octogenarian for admitting his mistake.
“I have a great deal of admiration and respect for his courage to come forward to try to right an injustice. Not many people would do that, especially after all this time,” Donald Kagan, 39, told The Post in a jailhouse interview at Rikers Island.
Judge Frank Barbaro convicted Kagan of the fatal shooting of Wavell Wint, 22, in a 1999 nonjury trial.
The judge first came forward to authorities in 2011 to say Kagan — whom he sent away for 15 years to life — should go free because he had disregarded his self-defense claim, instead labeling him a “bigot” who “assassinated” a black man.
Kagan shot Wint during a struggle over Kagan’s necklace outside an East New York movie theater in 1998.
“I was prejudiced during the trial. I realized I made a terrible mistake and there was a man in jail because of my mistake,” Barbaro told Justice ShawnDya Simpson last week.
“It’s great that he was a champion for the underdog,” Kagan said of Barbaro’s past civil-rights activism. “But unfortunately it affected his judgment at my trial.
“I was never angry at him. I just couldn’t understand how he came to the decision he did. I don’t deserve to be here. Not for what I was convicted for.”
Kagan recounted how bizarre it was to see Barbaro reversing himself — and how the judge afterward tried to shake Kagan’s hand.
“It was very awkward. It was an awkward moment. I looked him in the eye. I nodded,” he said. “This whole thing is very surreal. It’s difficult to process that this is all happening right now.”
Kagan’s lawyers have filed a motion to overturn his conviction based on Barbaro’s unprecedented change of heart, including the judge’s claims he misheard what Kagan told Wint just before the shooting. Prosecutors are fighting to keep him behind bars. He is due back in court next month.
When told of Kagan’s forgiveness, Barbaro simply said, “I’m glad.”
Kagan said he would eventually like to reach out to the family of his victim, Wavell Wint, who want him to remain behind bars.
“I lost 15 years of my life — 15 years! I read a lot. I know the world has changed. It’s going to be a huge adjustment but I’ll adapt,” Kagan said. “I’d like to go back to school and get my master’s degree in social work. I’d like to help people.”