2020/03/17

(Hernando County, FL – March 9, 2020) — Today, Paul Hildwin accepted a plea agreement in a 1985 Hernando County murder prosecution to avoid a second death penalty trial, becoming a free man for the first time in nearly 35 years. The Court ordered Hildwin released with time served after he pled no contest to second degree murder, ending Hildwin’s long fight for justice — during which he spent nearly 30 years on Florida’s death row for a murder he always maintained he did not commit. He is expected to walk free from the Hernando County jail today.

In 2014, while Hildwin was represented by Fort Lauderdale attorney Martin McClain and the Innocence Project, the Florida Supreme Court reversed Hildwin’s capital murder conviction and death sentence. The Court’s ruling was based on DNA testing and a court-ordered search of the national DNA database which proved that critical evidence originally used to tie Hildwin to the crime actually belonged to the victim’s estranged boyfriend, whom Hildwin had always contended was the likely true killer. more