BALTIMORE — You can’t put a price on how much a wrongfully convicted person is owed after missing years of their life spent behind bars.
It’s a reality not many people know first hand like Walter Lomax.
He’s the namesake of a law enacted last year aimed at compensating exonerated individuals like himself and Adnan Syed.
Lomax, without a doubt, can fully identify with the vindication we saw unfold on cameras as Syed walked as a free man after spending more than 2 decades in prison.
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After spending nearly 40 years in prison for a murder he didn’t commit, Lomax was exonerated in 2014.
Then, legislators drafted the Lomax Act that passed unanimously in the General Assembly enacted last year.
Now with questions looming if Syed will be a beneficiary of the state's new law, for Lomax, it’s a clear answer.
“I think it’s more or less a matter of when which should be a short period of time cause he has some really really good people working on his behalf,” he shared.
The law makes compensation for exonerees equal to the median household income for the time they wrongfully served expedites what was years-long fight for justice in Lomax’s case.
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“I know that that’s the exact reason why something like the Walter Lomax Act was established was because again I was released in 2006. I had to fight eight more years just to clear my name just because there was some question in someone’s mind to the guilt or innocence,” said Lomax.
That eight year-legal battle Lomax endured is now a thing of the past in Maryland.
The new law designates administrative law judges to oversee the process and paves a clear path to compensation.
“Because of this legislation, some of the individuals that have been released are able to be compensated with a matter of months, so the difference between 2006 and 2019 when I was actually compensated that’s a great difference,” said Lomax.
Since Syed maintained his innocence and State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby moved forward with dropping the charges in the murder of Hae Min Lee, Lomax says the law named in his honor will right some wrongs in the criminal justice system.
SEE MORE: Timeline: Adnan Syed's 23-year journey to freedom
“In his particular case, there is nothing at this point conclusive that he didn’t commit the crime; however, there’s really nothing conclusive that he did commit it. And if he didn’t commit it, I think he should be adequately compensated as a result of that,” he shared.
