BOSTON (WHDH) - Sean Ellis spent more than 20 years behind bars for the killing of a Boston police officer before that conviction was thrown out.
Still, he says he is not completely free and is on a mission to clear his name.
“It just really bothers me that I have a conviction on my record,” he said. “And even more so I have a conviction on my record for something that’s not true.”
His dramatic story is detailed in the new Netflix documentary entitled “Trial 4.”
Ellis was a teen when he was charged with the execution-style murder of Detective John Mulligan in 1993.
His first two trials ended in hung juries. He was eventually found guilty during a third trial and sentenced to life behind bars.
Twenty years later, defense attorney Rosemary Scapicchio uncovered new evidence.
“The Boston Police and the Suffolk County DA’s office had this evidence the whole time, the whole entire time while Sean sat day after day after day in jail,” she said.
After a judge threw out his murder conviction and ordered a fourth trial, prosecutors dismissed the murder charges against Ellis but Scapicchio said she is not finished.
“He still stands before us today as a convicted felon and that’s not fair,” she said.
7NEWS has learned Ellis’s legal team has now filed a motion for a new trial on the only charges that were not dismissed — possession of Mulligan’s service weapon and another gun police say was used to kill him.
“We really believe that the same prejudice and bias and conflict issues that infected the murder conviction and the robbery conviction also infected the gun conviction,” Scapicchio said.
Current Suffolk County District Attorney Rachael Rollins admitted that she is skeptical of the gun charges.
“If a judge grants that motion for a new trial, we are dismissing this case….We are not moving forward. We are no longer prosecuting this,” Rollins said.
Should that happen, Rollins said Ellis deserves an apology.
“The three trials he has had to endure and the corruption, the massive corruption within the Boston Police Department,” she said. “There are many things that I believe Mr. Ellis deserves an apology for.”
“I think she understands, after watching ‘Trial 4,’ what a circus it was for Sean’s conviction to stand,” Scapicchio said.
Ellis said he hope the documentary will bring about changes he said have not come yet.
“The fact that ‘Trial 4’ highlighted all these blaring issues with police corruption and then you had detectives on ‘Trial 4’ that spoke about how pristine the investigation was…to me only speaks to the fact that the problem continues to exist,” Ellis said. “Am I angry or upset? I am. However, what I refused to do is to live my life in a way that I allow that anger to weigh me down. The most important thing for me now is a full and complete exoneration and the ability for me to live my life in a way that I desire.”
Scapicchio said if Ellis’s gun conviction is overturned or dismissed he could sue the city.
A spokesperson for the Boston Police Department said the department would not comment on a pending court case.
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