In 1991, William Henry Jamerson was arrested, tried, and convicted of rape and armed robbery in the course of roughly 90 days.

He spent 24 years in prison, skipping parole hearings because he knew to get parole, you have to admit guilt.

[Hear the KRMG In Depth Report on Jamerson’s case HERE]

Year after year he wrote letters, beginning in about 2000, asking that the evidence used against him be tested for DNA.

Year after year, the City of Tulsa responded that the evidence had been destroyed, pursuant to a court order.

Tulsa attorney Dan Smolen took Jamerson on as a client in about 2015, and continued to press the city to produce that evidence, or proof that it had indeed been destroyed.

“We reviewed it, and I didn’t see any order for destruction, and they had failed to produce a chain of custody on the evidence,” Smolen told KRMG. “And it took me seven and a half, eight years to get a court to order me to go search the property room myself, because they were unable to ever establish a full chain of custody on the property receipts.”

When he did personally search the evidence storage facility, he demanded to see those property receipts - and after a search, he says he was told to take a lunch and come back in an hour.

When he returned, he knew immediately something had turned up.

“Crickets when we walked in, and you could see - there was a different expression, there was a different feel in the room,' Smolen said. ”And they presented a manila envelope, and then forensically we opened it. Inside was, essentially the Holy Grail of DNA, was the slide that had been maintained from the rape kit. And it was the actual evidence that was used in trial to convict him."

The evidence that the city and the police department had maintained was destroyed years ago.

The evidence that, when tested for DNA, absolutely excluded Jamerson as the man whose sample was lifted from that rape kit.

The woman who was the victim of that rape back in 1991 now says police coerced her into accusing Jamerson, saying they had conclusive proof he was the rapist.

She maintains that they even altered a forensic drawing - which was created by an officer with no training in forensic art - to look more like Jamerson.

She was in the courtroom in July when a judge overturned Jamerson’s convictions, deeming him “actually innocent.”

Last week, Jamerson’s name was ordered stricken from the sex offender registry.

And yet - his battle to clear his name continues.

D. A. Steve Kunzweiler’s office confirms that the decision to overturn Jamerson’s convictions is under appeal, though KRMG was not allowed to ask questions or interview anyone about the case.

Meanwhile, Smolen plans to file a civil rights case in federal court, probably within the next few weeks.

Jamerson told KRMG all he wants is full acknowledgement - once and for all - that he’s an innocent man.

Nothing, he knows, can replace the decades he lost as the victim of a miscarriage of justice.

Listen the KRMG In Depth Report on the most recent developments here.