Lawyers for the Brooklyn tattoo artist who accused police of sodomizing him in a Brooklyn subway station claim police altered key evidence — his underwear — before the criminal trial.
Two weeks before the start of Michael Mineo’s $440 million civil trial against the NYPD and three officers, his lawyers yesterday said investigators cut a hole in the underwear, undermining the prosecution.
“Police officers initially investigating the Oct. 15, 2008, incident cut out material on Mr. Mineo’s underwear to make it appear as if the hole that resulted from the ASP [baton] puncturing through his underwear during the assault was shaped as a square,” said Mineo’s civil lawyer, Stephen Jackson.
A jury acquitted the three cops in February, but they could still be liable for damages in the civil case.