Wrongfully Jailed Man Wins Suit

When he was arrested for attacking Hazel Weeks, the illiterate Fauquier farm laborer also confessed to four other crimes, including the Williams slaying in neighboring Culpeper. Washington was convicted and sentenced to death with no forensic or physical evidence.

The conviction and death sentence were largely based on a confession in which he got several key details wrong. Washington initially described Williams, who was white, as black. He also said Williams was alone.

In their lawsuit, Washington's attorneys alleged that police and prosecutors coerced Washington, who has an IQ of 69, into confessing to a crime he did not commit and ignored details that pointed to his innocence.

In 1994, then-Gov. L. Douglas Wilder (D) commuted Washington's sentence to life in prison after primitive forensic tests cast doubt on his guilt. In 2000, then-Gov. James S. Gilmore III pardoned him after more advanced testing failed to connect Washington to the crime and revealed that the DNA left on a blanket in Williams's apartment was that of Kenneth Tinsley, a serial rapist serving a life prison sentence.

Further DNA testing in 2004 showed that semen found on the victim's body was left by Tinsley, and the stipulation filed during the trial said DNA had identified Tinsley "as the attacker of Mrs. Williams." He has not been charged in the Williams slaying.

At yesterday's trial, attorneys for Wilmore's estate said that if the investigator had fabricated evidence, he had done so unintentionally and that Washington could have learned what he knew about Williams's death from gossip in the community, Neufeld said.

But Washington denied that yesterday, saying that Wilmore fed him details such as what the victim was wearing when she was killed. "I didn't know anything about the crime," Washington said.

Staff writer Maria Glod contributed to this report.