Twenty-eight years after Philadelphia prosecutors first sought to take his life for the murder of four-year-old Barbara Jean Horn, Walter Ogrod (pictured, second from right, with members of his defense team) has been exonerated from Pennsylvania’s death row.

In a dramatic virtual hearing on June 5, 2020 that was attended by Ogrod, his family, Barbara Jean’s mother, counsel, and the media, Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas Judge Shelley Robins New granted a joint motion by prosecutors and defense counsel to overturn his wrongful conviction and death sentence. Robins New denied Philadelphia prosecutors’ motion to dismiss the charges against Ogrod saying she lacked jurisdiction to do so, but agreed to reduce the charges to third-degree murder, allowing Ogrod to be released on bail.