A 71-year-old American man who spent nearly five decades in prison for a murder he did not commit will receive $7.15 million in compensation from the American city of Oklahoma, where he was convicted.
Glynn Simmons, who is black, served more time behind bars before being exonerated than any other inmate in US history, according to the National Registry of Exonerations.
Simmons was released last year after serving a total of 48 years, one month and 18 days in prison.
Simmons' lawyers said the payment represented a "partial settlement" of his lawsuit "against the cities and police who falsified evidence to frame him for murder."
"Mr Simmons spent a tragically long time in prison for a crime he did not commit," said lawyer Elizabeth Wang, quoted by AFP.
"Although Edmund will never make up for lost time, this settlement will allow him to move forward. At the same time, he will continue to assert his claim against Oklahoma City and the lead detective," Wang stressed.
Simmons and another man, Don Roberts, were sentenced to death in 1975 for killing a 30-year-old liquor store clerk the previous year during a robbery in Edmond. Their sentences were later commuted to life imprisonment.
Simmons and Roberts were convicted solely on the testimony of a teenage customer who was shot in the head during the robbery but survived.
She "recognized" them to the police, but a thorough investigation casts serious doubt on the reliability of her identification.
Both men said at trial that they weren't even in Oklahoma at the time of the murder.
U.S. District Court Judge Amy Palumbo threw out Simmons' sentence last July. He was formally found not guilty in December. Roberts was released from prison in 2008. |BGNES
