Philadelphia man reaches $9.1M settlement with city after being wrongfully convicted of murder
PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- A Philadelphia man who was released from prison after spending nearly three decades on death row for a murder he says he did not commit has reached a $9.1 million wrongful conviction settlement with the city.
Walter Ogrod was arrested and sentenced to death after being convicted in the July 1988 murder of 4-year-old Barbara Jean Horn.
Her body was found stuffed in a television box on a curb in front of her Castor Gardens home.
However, an Action News investigation revealed DNA evidence did not link him to the crime scene.
Ogrod went to trial twice - the first was declared a mistrial before he was convicted in October of 1996.
Ogrod said police coerced his confession and a Common Pleas judge overturned the conviction three years ago after he spent 28 years in prison.
SEE ALSO: Walter Ogrod, man serving time for murder of 4-year-old Barbara Jean Horn, freed on bail
Ogrod's lawyers plan to talk about settlement in a press conference Monday.
"I believe firmly he was wrongly convicted," Horn's mother has previously said. "We hope that we get to have the person who took Barbara Jean away from us to pay for the crimes that he did."
PHOTO GALLERY: Remembering Barbara Jean Horn
Horn's murder has not yet been solved.
Action News reached out to the City of Philadelphia for comment on the settlement.
