Innocent Man Awarded $25 Million After 38 Years in Prison
A man who was wrongfully imprisoned for 38 years in California has been awarded $25 million, which his legal team is calling the largest illegal settlement in the state’s history.
The settlement was finalized in August, as disclosed in court documents released on Monday.
Maurice Hastings, now 72, was wrongfully convicted of the 1983 sexual assault and murder of Roberta Widermee, resulting in a life sentence without the possibility of parole.
The lawsuit criticized the actions of two officers from the Inglewood Police Department and agents from the Los Angeles District Attorney’s office involved in Hastings’ wrongful conviction.
“I can’t get back the 38 years of my life that were taken from me,” Hastings remarked in a statement, expressing both his loss and some sense of closure.
He added, “This settlement marks a welcome end to a very long journey, and I look forward to starting anew.” Hastings’ attorneys and a spokesman for the city of Inglewood did not respond to requests for comments on the matter.
Details regarding the settlement remain largely undisclosed. This development follows decades of legal battles during which Hastings maintained his innocence.
According to the District Attorney’s Office, during the victim’s autopsy, evidence was collected, including body fluids linked to the perpetrator. Hastings had requested a DNA test in 2000, but the DA’s office turned down his plea.
In 2021, Hastings formally pleaded not guilty to the Conviction Consistency Unit of the DA’s office, and DNA testing eventually confirmed that the fluid was not his. This led to the invalidation of his conviction in 2022 at the age of 69, after a request from a prosecutor and his attorney.
DNA evidence matched profiles in a database to convictions related to other violent crimes. Following unrelated charges of car theft, Kenneth Packnett was arrested less than three weeks after the murder and was later implicated in Widermee’s murder due to items found in his possession. However, Packnett had not been identified as a suspect at the time of Hastings’ conviction.
Packnett passed away in prison in 2020 while serving a separate sentence. In 2023, a California judge declared Hastings “effectively innocent,” affirming that the evidence demonstrated he did not commit the crime.
Hastings currently resides in Southern California and is reportedly engaged with his church. His attorney, Nick Blastin, emphasized that police departments nationwide must recognize the serious consequences of such miscarriages of justice.
