The city of Edmond, Oklahoma, has agreed to pay over $7 million to Glynn Ray Simmons, a former death row inmate who spent nearly 50 years behind bars for a crime he did not commit, A CBS News/ The Associated Press report read.
The Edmond City Council voted unanimously on Monday to settle the lawsuit Simmons filed against the city and a former police detective.
Simmons, now 71, was 22 when he was imprisoned in 1975 along with his co-defendant Don Roberts as the two who robbed a store and shot a clerk.. He has maintained that he was in Louisiana at the time of the crime. However, both Simmons and Roberts were convicted of the murder of the liquor store clerk, Carolyn Sue Rogers, and sentenced to death.
Their sentences were reduced to life in prison in 1977 after US Supreme Court rulings related to capital punishment and Roberts was released on parole in 2008.
Source: The Washington Post
Simmons’ attorney, Elizabeth Wang, stated that while the settlement can’t erase the years lost, it will help him move forward.
“Mr. Simmons spent a tragic amount of time incarcerated for a crime he did not commit,” Wang said.
The lawsuit alleged that the police falsified a report and withheld evidence, leading to Simmons’ wrongful conviction. While the settlement with Edmond has resolved that portion of the lawsuit, separate claims against Oklahoma City and a retired detective are still pending.
Simmons’ case garnered national attention as he became the longest-serving US inmate to be exonerated, having served served 48 years, one month and 18 days, according to The National Registry of Exonerations. He was released from prison in July 2023 after a judge vacated his conviction and sentence.
