A North Carolina man who spent 44 years in prison after being wrongfully convicted of raping a woman in 1976 has reached a historic $25 million (about N25 billion) combined settlement in a civil lawsuit in the U.S.
Ronnie Long, 68, received $22 million from the city and $3 million from the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation, according to one of his lawyers, Jamie T. Lau.
In a written public apology to Mr. Long on Tuesday, the Concord City Council said: “We are deeply remorseful for the past wrongs that caused tremendous h@rm to Mr. Long, his family, friends and our community. Mr. Long suffered the extraordinary loss of his freedom and a substantial portion of his life because of this conviction.
He wrongly served 44 years, 3 months and 17 days in prison for a crime he did not commit. While there are no measures to fully restore to Mr. Long and his family all that was taken from them, through this agreement we are doing everything in our power to right the past wrongs and take responsibility.”
Mr. Long was a 21-year-old cement mason with a 2-year-old son when he was convicted on Oct. 1, 1976, of breaking into a home in Concord, about 25 miles northeast of Charlotte, and raping a 54-year-old woman earlier that year. He was sentenced to two concurrent life sentences even though no physical evidence linked him to the crime, his lawyers said.
Mr. Long’s lawyers said the Concord police had been under pressure to close the case in part because the victim’s late husband had been an executive at a local textile company, Cannon Mills, which had offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest, NYTimes reports.
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