Florida Man Sentenced To 400 Years Is Now Free. “I never lost hope”

57 year old Sidney Holmes, a black man who served more than 34 years of a 400-year sentence for an armed robbery in April 1989, in which he was suspected of being the getaway driver was released from a Florida jail this week after prosecutors dismissed the charges which he was wrongfully convicted.

After his release he said in a statement from the Innocent Project of Florida, “I never lost hope and always knew this day would come," “I cannot wait to hug my mother in the free world for the first time in over 34 years."

Based on the recent review of the case, prosecutors "determined that Holmes had a plausible claim of innocence because of how he became a suspect and because of the precarious eyewitness identification that was the principal evidence against him at trial," the state attorney's office said.