Rachael Rollins, the Suffolk County District Attorney in the state of Massachusetts, has filed a motion that could end the prosecution of Sean Ellis who was convicted for the murder of a Boston police detective in 1993.

Ellis’ conviction for the murder of Boston Police Detective John J. Mulligan fell under harsh scrutiny and raised major questions about police corruption and prosecutorial misconduct.

According to Rollins’ motion, the police department’s conduct during their investigation showcased police corruption and a failure in integrity from the prosecutorial team.

“The aforementioned corruption of BPD, coupled with the unconstitutional withholding of evidence by this Office and our overall failure of inquiry, are disgraceful chapters in our history,” Rollins wrote. “This level of misconduct and indifference by the prosecution team (both BPD and the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office) cannot be condoned, ignored, or tolerated. We must learn from our mistakes.”

Officers involved in the investigation, Kenneth Acerra, John Brazil, and Walter Robinson, were said to have “coerced and intimidated witnesses and concealed evidence”  according to a report in The Boston Globe. Rollins argues their conduct calls for wiping out Ellis’ remaining conviction of gun possession charges which could create a path for Ellis to file a wrongful conviction suit for restitution for his years behind bars.

The Globe also reported that in 2015, the Supreme Judicial Court ordered a new trial, Ellis’ fourth, in his conviction for Mulligan’s murder, however, in 2017 then-District Attorney John Pappas decided not to go forward with a case that had become severely compromised.

Ellis’ attorney, Rosemary Scapicchio, is seeking to overturn his conviction for possession of Mulligan’s service weapons, the only charge for which he remains convicted.

“This is what a progressive DA looks like,” Scapicchio said in a telephone interview with The Globe. “It’s uncomfortable to come to these conclusions. But you have to if you want to effectuate change. That’s what Rachael Rollins did.”

Scapicchio has also called for a review of her cases involving Robinson, Acerra, and Brazil. “I’m confident that there are other Sean Ellises sitting in jail cells,” she said.

DA assents to Attorney Scapicchio’s Motion for a New Trial for Sean Ellis. This is a huge step in obtaining justice for Sean! pic.twitter.com/nC5QRAvWyM

— Rosemary Scapicchio (@RosemaryScapicc) March 17, 2021

The motion for a new trial for weapons possession rests with Suffolk Superior Court Judge Robert Ullman, who could likely hold a hearing to consider the motion to drop the charge. Alternatively, Ullman could choose to order a new trial which would allow the state to drop the case, an option that Rollins has stated that she would indeed drop the case if such a trial were granted.

Ellis’ experience gained national attention in 2020 when a documentary about the case was released by Netflix.

Ellis served 22 years in prison before a court ordered him released in 2015.