Early on the morning of March 16, 1998, a wiseguy named Guy Zappulla walked into the Golden Gate Inn motel in Brooklyn with Jennifer Scarpati, his girlfriend, after a day of partying on a boat and binging on crack.

The two camped out in Room 234 of that motel for more than a day, with Zappulla even calling one of his friends to pick up some spare jewelry, to sell for more crack. Other witnesses, and surveillance tapes, placed Zappulla and Scarpati in the room on the last day the woman was seen alive.

The next day, cops showed up at the motel and found Scarpati's body. She had been choked to death and shoved under a mattress. The cops arrested Zappulla.

He was no stranger to the system and had been arrested at least ten times before, including one charge of racketeering "with a predicate of solicitation to commit murder." Zappulla confessed. He was convicted. The judge gave him 25 years in prison.

Now, though, it looks like Zappulla could be a free man. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals, in a ruling today, vacated his conviction.

The reason? Cops didn't read Zappulla his Miranda warnings a second time before he confessed and was formally charged in the woman's death, and then the confession was wrongfully used as evidence at trial, the court said.

Circuit Judge Reena Raggi dissented:

I conclude that, even without Zappulla’s challenged confession, his commission of this brutal crime was established by overwhelming evidence.

Zappulla has been, in the past, a federal witness against at least one organized crime figure in New York, according to this piece by Gangland reporter Jerry Capeci.