Longtime Delaware death row inmate set free

A man who spent more than two decades on Delaware’s death row is once again a free man. 

Forty-one-year-old Jermaine Wright walked out of the maximum-security prison in Smyrna and into the arms of his mother Friday after a judge signed an order suppressing a confession that Wright gave to police following the 1991 killing of liquor store clerk Phillip Seifert. 

The judge had previously noted that Wright was under the influence of heroin and not properly advised of his rights during the lengthy police interrogation that resulted in the confession.

The confession was a linchpin for prosecutors at Wright’s 1992 murder trial. 

Prosecutors promptly moved to dismiss the charges against Wright last week to clear the way for an appeal to the Delaware Supreme Court on the judge’s ruling.