Man Freed After 23 Years In Prison For Crime He Didn’t Commit Dies

Lopez never should have gone to prison. The judge that finally released him called the case against him “rotten from day one,” based on the flimsy testimony of alleged eyewitnesses who turned out to be unreliable. Lopez’s daughter, just one year old when he went to prison, grew up without him. Upon his release, he came back to the world with nothing; he had to rely on the largesse of a private foundation for housing.

Lopez filed a lawsuit against the [New York City], seeking millions of dollars in damages for his incarcerations. The New York Post reports that the suit was set to begin hearings this week. But William Lopez will never see any of that money. He died of an asthma attack on Saturday. ThePost quotes Lopez’s friend and supporter Jeffrey Deskovic saying, “He wanted to do some domestic travel to other states, and to travel internationally. He wanted to go to college and to go to law school. He wanted to set his wife up in business, and he wanted to be an entrepreneur.”