PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The City of Philadelphia has agreed to pay a multi-million dollar settlement to a man who was wrongfully convicted of murder and spent nearly 30 years in prison.
Walter Ogrod, 59, agreed to a $9.1 million settlement with the city for his wrongful conviction in the 1988 murder of 4-year-old Barbara Jean Horn.
Ogrod was arrested and charged with her murder in 1992 and says he never gave up fighting, breaking 8 typewriters during his time on death row, and reaching out to anyone who could possibly help prove his innocence.
"I did break my typewriter,” Ogrod said. “They thought I was nuts the way I was going."
In 2020, a judge overturned Ogrod's conviction based, in part, on police coercing a false confession, and released him from a state prison.
Now, Ogrod says he wants to advocate for others wrongfully accused of crimes, as he says there are “so many innocent people in jail right now."
He adds he would like to buy a building, fix it up, and have a place for those wrongfully accused to stay because "most of the people after 20, 30, 40 years have no family left, they got no place to go."
"And I [would] like to have something out there, away from the bad neighborhoods, somewhere that is nice, peaceful, and they can go there to decompress and relax and get on with their lives."
Ogrod says he has been in touch with Sharon Fahy, the mother of Jean, and wants to help find her daughter’s killer.
"I'm in communication with her. I will give some money for a private fund to get a private detective."
This is the city’s third-largest wrongful conviction lawsuit settlement.