A 55-year-old man who has been in prison for a 1983 murder he says he did not commit was ordered today to be released from jail, a week after his murder conviction was overturned by a judge who found that a key prosecution witness had lied.

Willie Earl Green has consistently maintained he was wrongly convicted of the 1983 slaying of a woman at a crack house in South Los Angeles. That conviction was overturned last week, and the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office announced Wednesday it would not seek to have him retried.

"I am so excited, elated," Green’s wife, Mary, told reporters outside court today. "I’ve been waiting for this day for a long time."

In overturning the conviction, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Stephen A. Marcus ruled Green did not receive a fair trial because jurors were never given information that probably would have undermined the credibility of the only witness who identified Green as one of two men responsible for the killing.

The witness, Willie Finley, recently recanted his trial testimony, saying he was high on cocaine during the killing and had been helped by police to identify Green as a suspect.

Marcus also found that detectives had improperly tainted the identification process by telling Finley that Green had previously been convicted of stealing from the victim.

Mary Green credited her faith with helping her and her husband persevere over the past two decades.

—From news services

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