Sandra Hemme was released from prison this Friday after 43 years locked up for a murder conviction that has been annulled by the Supreme Court of Missouri, in the United States.
“We are grateful that Ms. Hemme has finally been reunited with her family after 43 years. She has spent more than four decades wrongfully locked up for a crime with which she had nothing to do,” the team posted of Hemme Lawyers. “Tonight she is surrounded by her loved ones, where she should have been all along. We will continue fighting until her name is cleared,” she added.
Hemme has left the Chillicothe Correctional Center on foot, according to the Missouri Department of Corrections. The release occurred ten minutes before the scheduled issuance of a court order for his release against Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey, radio station KSHB 41 reported.
The prisoner was sentenced to life in prison for the stabbing murder of a librarian, Patricia Jeschke, in 1980, but a month ago the State Supreme Court ordered her release within 30 days. Baily has attempted over the past month to prevent Hemme’s release.
This is the longest known case of wrongful imprisonment in the United States, surpassing the cases of Darryl Burton and Lamonte McIntyre, who each spent more than two decades in prison before being exonerated. Hemme’s lawyers work for the Miracle of Innocence Project, the NGO created by Burton and McIntyre after their release.
“She’s been there for 43 years. It’s almost the same time that Lamonte and I spent together. Between the two of us we were there for 47 years,” Burton highlighted, according to the local station. “I have the feeling of being free again. I know how it feels,” McIntyre noted for her part. Burton was released in 2008 and McIntyre in 2017.
Hemme’s case “is proof of how necessary a reform of the system is.” “He’s broken. He’s been broken for decades and decades. It shouldn’t take this long for an innocent person to come out because it’s that easy to put an innocent person in jail,” Burton argued.
The Miracle of Innocence Project has already called for a one-mile march for next Saturday, July 27, from the organization’s headquarters in Kansas.
