A US District Court Judge Amy Palumbo, has declared 71-year-old black man, Glynn Simmons innocent of a crime of murder for which he was convicted. His exoneration comes after he has spent close to 50 years in prison.
According to the National Registry of Exonerations, Simmons, was served more time behind bars before being exonerated than any other inmate in US history.
The court first threw out his conviction in July before declaring him innocent on Tuesday. Simmons was released in July after serving a total of 48 years, one month and 18 days in prison.
Simmons and another man, Don Roberts, were sentenced to death in 1975 after being convicted of the murder of a 30-year-old liquor store clerk during a robbery in Edmond, Oklahoma.
But their sentences were later commuted to life in prison. Their conviction was on the basis of the testimony of a teenage customer who survived a shot to her head during the robbery.
Speaking to journalists after he was declared innocent, Simmons said, “This is a day we’ve been waiting on for a long, long time. We can say justice was done today, finally.”
Roberts, Simmons co-defendant, had been released from prison since 2008.