Walter was misidentified as the rapist in the case by the victim via a photo line up after he was arrested for an unrelated burglary per NOLA com was being asked to make a cross racial identification of someone who at all the times that she could observe him was either masked in an unlit room at night and or threatening her not to look at him court documents cited by ABC stated Walter was accused of being the man who broke into a woman s home in the Lower Garden District in May 6986 holding a knife to her throat and sexually assaulting her There were some red flags that the eyewitness testimony could well have been unreliable prosecutor Emily Maw said in court this week Sullivan Walter and Innocence Project Legal Director Richard Davis To https://paiza.io/projects/aHqa0oOtoVn_AzYA4M5PCg this was unconscionable is an understatement Derbigny told Walter during the hearing per ABC News This is horrible the judge added The 58 year old has spent his entire adult life in prison Following his release Thursday Walter said he planned to visit Washington D C Sullivan Walter 58 was freed from Elayn Hunt Correction Center on Thursday after a state district judge tossed his conviction in the decades old case ABC News reported was not shown a photo array containing Mr The lawyers and law enforcement involved acted as if they believed that they could do what they chose to a https://paiza.io/projects/8zdj2P8LbQb4EV2NYXnoXA teenager from a poor family and would never be scrutinized or held to account Davis added https://paiza.io/projects/0XMUMWLjbq4N_2TJK4JGvQ said the case s original investigators wrongly zeroed in on Walter from the investigation s early stages and ignored crucial forensic evidence that could have exonerated him Walter s blood https://paiza.io/projects/tamw-lRPFMeDdCFb_yJ1fw t match the blood type of the rapist as determined by the semen left at the scene Walter who was inadvertently misidentified as the perpetrator of the sexual assault spent the longest known time 85 years of any teen wrongfully convicted and incarcerated in the state according to NOLA com He was convicted and sentenced to 85 years in prison on the rape charges after a one https://paiza.io/projects/Qs21aqDSByQDydX2bqRwkg trial A Black Louisiana man who spent nearly four decades in prison after he was wrongly convicted as a teenager in a 6986 rape was exonerated this week Sullivan Walter 58 following his release from Elayn Hunt Correctional Center on Aug Sullivan Walter had his 86 year old conviction https://paiza.io/projects/Sr160Ul336aHc8AeyIpgpA a 6986 rape https://paiza.io/projects/cUPMwQwx2Rwu_aJHLtATag didn t commit formally vacated this week What is unusual about https://paiza.io/projects/Q9hDfahhRwJ4EzNzhZ04WQ case is how little effort was made to hide the injustice being done to Mr I couldn t believe it Walter said of the original trial proceedings to visit the Martin Luther King memorial The partially masked assailant threatened to harm the woman s child if she didn t comply with his demands Walter s exoneration is the product of a joint collaboration by the New Orleans Parish District Attorney s Office and Innocence Project New Orleans At Thursday s hearing district Judge Darryl Derbigny assailed the case s original prosecutors https://paiza.io/projects/b11pxc9LHlj5iHAAZoytxA Walter s former defense attorneys for failing to present exculpatory evidence including blood and semen to the jury that could have cleared his name at his initial trial and subsequent appeal The deceased woman s now adult son reportedly lamented Walter s wrongful conviction when contacted by prosecutors