Ex-sheriff’s is declared factually innocent

Man who spent 38 years in prison for murder

By Terri Vermeulen Keith, City News Service

Aman who spent 38 years behind bars for the 1983 abduction and murder of a woman in Inglewood was declared factually innocent Wednesday of the crime. Superior Court Judge William C. Ryan noted that the request for a finding of factual innocence for Maurice Hastings came in a motion jointly filed by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office and the Los Angeles Innocence Project.

“… I find him factually innocent,” the judge said during the brief hearing in a downtown Los Angeles courtroom.

Hastings, 69, was released from custody last October after his conviction was vacated for the abduction, sexual assault and slaying of 30-year-old Roberta Wydermyer, along with the attempted murder of Wydermyer’s husband, Billy Ray, and his friend, George Pinson.

Martha Carrillo, deputy in charge of the District Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Unit, told Hastings that he deserved to hear that he is factually innocent in a courtroom, and it comes with a “long overdue apology.”

“You have fought for your innocence all these years,” Carrillo told Hastings. “You are, in fact, factually innocent.”

She noted that Louis Sepe — one of the attorneys who represented Hastings in his first trial in which jurors deadlocked — had been accused of putting up a false alibi and said she hopes that Hastings feels vindicated in the work that Sepe had done for him.

Sepe was among those in the downtown Los Angeles courtroom who hugged Hastings after the judge’s finding, which was met with a round of applause.

Ayesha Hussain, a staff attorney for Los Angeles Innocence Project, told the judge that the factual innocence finding was “crucial” to ensuring that justice is done.

“Mr. Hastings has maintained his innocence from the very beginning,” she said, noting that DNA testing that exonerated him proved he was “right all along.” Hastings said after the hearing the factual innocence ruling “means a lot to me.”