Albert Woodfox, the only remaining member of the "Angola 3" still in prison, may once again be a free man soon.
U.S. District Judge James J. Brady ruled on Monday that Woodfox, whose lawyers say has spent more than 43 years in solitary confinement, should be free rather than have to sit through a third trial, according to CNN. Brady came to the decision because of "exceptional circumstances," which include Woodfox's poor health, age (68) and "lack of confidence in the state to provide a fair third trial."
However, a federal appeals court temporarily blocked the inmate's release on Tuesday afternoon. Louisiana Attorney General Buddy Caldwell is appealing Brady's ruling because "Woodfox is a killer who should remain locked up," reports the Associated Press.
The court order Caldwell filed will postpone Woodfox's potential release until at least Friday.
Woodfox is one of three people that were convicted in the 1972 killing of Brent Miller, who was a guard at Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. The inmate has consistently pleaded his innocence. At Angola because of a prior armed robbery charge, Woodfox claims he was treated unfairly because he was outspoken against "injustices" at the prison.
"Woodfox... has said he had tried to point out injustices at the prison and was targeted and wrongfully accused because of his activism as a Black Panther," according to the CNN report.
His two previous convictions connected to this case were overturned, and the inmate's lawyers successfully argued with Brady that another trial, especially after spending more than four decades in solitary confinement, would be an injustice to Woodfox.
At the time of Miller's killing, inmates were protesting harsh conditions inside the prison.
The two other members of the "Angola 3," a name for the group coined by the numerous people that have protested the inmates' very long stints in solitary confinement, did not fully serve their sentences either.
Robert King was released from prison in 2001. He was serving time for killing a fellow inmate but the conviction was overturned. The other "Angola 3" inmate, Herman Wallace, was freed in 2013. A judge vacated his conviction in the Miller case, in part because Wallace was terminally ill with cancer. He died just days after being released..
King and Wallace, like Woodfox, claimed innocence and unfair trials connected to Miller's death.
When Wallace was freed, U.S. District Chief Judge Brian A. Jackson in Baton Rouge said "women were systematically excluded from the grand jury that indicted Wallace," according to CNN.
Brady's ruling in the Woodfox case was hailed as a "momentous step toward justice" by Amnesty International on Monday.
