A prison inmate in Louisiana was released on Tuesday after spending 30 years on death row for the murder of a jeweler, CBS News reported.
Glenn Ford, 64, was freed from Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola after a judge signed an order vacating his first-degree murder conviction and subsequent death sentence. According to CBS 12, he was the state's longest serving inmate on death row.
The order said that "credible evidence" was analyzed by the Caddo Parish district attorney in late 2013 "supporting a finding that Glenn Ford was neither present at, nor a participant in, the robbery and murder of Isadore Rozeman." However, prosecutors did not specify what the exact evidence is, citing an ongoing investigation.
On Nov. 5, 1983, Rozeman, 56, was found fatally shot behind the counter of his shop. Though three other men were arrested with Ford, they were eventually dismissed from the case.
The order added "the State now believes that whatever the involvement of Glenn Ford in the robbery or murder of Isadore Rozeman, the new information, if known at the time of the trial, would reasonably have resulted in a different outcome. ... Indeed, if the information had been within the knowledge of the state, Glenn Ford might not even have been arrested or indicted for this offense."
In Louisiana, there is a law that entitles wrongly convicted and sentenced inmates to certain amounts of money to make up for time served. The state will pay $25,000 per year of wrongful incarceration up to $250,000 and up to $80,000 for loss of "life opportunities."
Additionally, a release by law firm Squire Sanders LLP suggested multiple factors of the case were working against Ford.
"According to Mr. Ford's attorneys, his trial was profoundly compromised by inexperienced counsel and by the unconstitutional suppression of evidence at his trial, including information from an informant, a suppressed police report related to the time of the crime, and evidence of the murder weapon, which implicated the true perpetrator" the statement read.
