Friday, October 2, 2026
A man who was arrested, charged and ultimately cleared for robbing an East Rockaway CVS and a nearby carjacking and robbery is suing Nassau County, the county Police Department and the Nassau County Correctional Center for $2 million for wrongful arrest.
David Melis, 60, of Holtsville, is accusing county police officers of falsifying evidence and conspiracy when he was charged with the crimes. He also states that police “unduly influenced and/or coerced” witnesses to choose him from police photos. The suit was filed on July 22 in U.S. District Court in Central Islip.
Melis also faulted unnamed officials and supervisors at the county jail in East Meadow for “deliberate indifference” in failing to train and discipline police and jail employees.
According to police reports from April 22, 2015, a man left the CVS store on Ocean Avenue in East Rockaway without paying for merchandise. Two store employees chased him west on Prospect Avenue, which runs behind the store, and caught him. After a brief struggle, the store manager recovered the stolen property, but the man ran off, pursued once again on Prospect Avenue.
There he confronted a woman in front of her home who was getting into a 2010 Toyota Corolla, which was running. He pushed her out of the way and jumped in.
Witnesses ran to the woman’s aid and attempted to pull the man from the car, but he shifted into reverse, struck a parked vehicle behind him and then drove forward, across the victim’s lawn, before heading east and disappearing. No injuries were reported in the incident, and the car was not recovered.
As reported in the Herald’s April 30-May 6, 2015, issue, Nassau County detectives, acting partly on the basis of eyewitness accounts, arrested Melis at his home days after the incident, and charged him with second- and third-degree robbery and petit larceny for robbing the CVS and stealing the woman’s car. He was also charged with fourth-degree grand larceny and two counts of petit larceny for incidents at other CVS locations eight days earlier.
Shortly afterward, Melis’s attorney, Mark Nadjar, obtained a CVS store video of a man shoplifting on April 22. Nadjar claimed that the man on the video and his client were not the same person. “Look … he walks different, he’s got a different build … even his bald spot is different,” Nadjar told the Herald last year. “This is not Mr. Melis.” News12 aired the video, which, Nadjar said, led to Melis’s release.
Nadjar said at the time that Melis was never anywhere near the scene of either crime, and that police apparently showed witnesses a photo array and got them to “finger” his client.
On June 28, 2015, after further investigation, police arrested Alexander Wachmyanin, 50, who has no known address, for the crimes. The Nassau County district attorney’s office dropped all charges against Melis. “My office, the Police Department and the medical examiner’s office thoroughly investigated this case and the evidence presented by Mr. Melis’s attorney,” said then Acting D.A. Madeline Singas. “My office dismissed the charges against Mr. Melis after video and DNA evidence made clear that Mr. Wachmyanin committed these crimes.”
“Even though, apparently, the new suspect had pending criminal charges more closely resembling the crimes charged herein, presumably they did not show the witnesses any photo of the new suspect,” Nadjar said of Wachmyanin. “I do not believe the police or the prosecution ever saw the CVS surveillance video until I obtained it and News12 aired it … notwithstanding what they told the court, to get my client arrested and detained.”
Wachmyanin was charged with two counts of second-degree robbery, two counts of grand larceny and three counts of petit larceny. He was also ordered to pay $30,059.23 in restitution.
He was sentenced in March to 3½ to 7 years in prison for shoplifting from several supermarkets and drugstores.
Nadjar said that once Melis’s name, address and photo were released to the press, his client was attacked in person and on social media. “All the while,” Nadjar added, “a dangerous criminal was allowed to roam free.”
Through a spokeswoman, County Attorney Carnell Foskey declined to comment due to the pending litigation.
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