Getting away with murder

A woman who prosecutors said was an accessory to a killing was acquitted yesterday of murder charges, though she was convicted of a misdemeanor in the case.

Charlene Blackman, 42, of West Babylon, has been at the center of a controversy ever since the Nassau district attorney's office decided to charge her with second-degree murder in the death of Peter Jones, even though police were treating her as a witness.

Soon after Ricardo Marsden, 19, of Hempstead, was charged with killing Jones in a botched robbery attempt, Blackman told police that she had visited Jones just before his death Sept. 3, 2006.

Blackman told police that Marsden had threatened her with a gun, forcing her to visit Jones in the middle of the night, then leave the door open when she left his Freeport apartment so that Marsden could go in and rob him.

But prosecutors said certain elements of Blackman's story didn't add up, and they suspected that she had conspired with Marsden in the robbery. Marsden has since been convicted of murder in the case and is awaiting sentence.

Blackman's attorney, Joseph LoPiccolo of Garden City, said he was thrilled that she can go home. "A woman who was facing life in jail ... walked away from a horrific incident in her life," he said.

Although Blackman was convicted of fourth-degree criminal facilitation, a misdemeanor, prosecutors also declared victory. They said they pursued the case despite difficult circumstances, and were vindicated because Blackman has been convicted of a crime.

Early in the case, Blackman's indictment was thrown out because Judge Meryl Berkowitz ruled that prosecutors should not have shown the grand jury a videotape of a prosecutor interviewing her.

Berkowitz is scheduled to sentence Blackman, who faces up to a year in jail, on Aug. 15 at Nassau County Court in Mineola.