The Maryland Court of Appeals ruled that Prince George’s County still has to pay $5 million to a man who says he was wrongly imprisoned for his wife’s death in 1999.
A jury awarded Keith Longtin $6.2 million in 2006, though it was eventually reduced in court to $5 million. The county will have to pay 10 percent interest, required by state law, which could be an extra $2 million.
The county had appealed the judgment. In 2010, the Maryland Court of Special Appeals upheld the award.
Longtin said he was kept in prison for his wife’s death even after authorities “obtained exculpatory DNA evidence and evidence of a serial rapist in the area where Longtin’s wife was killed, but failed to inform Longtin or release him,” according to the decision.
He had spent more than eight months in prison. Six of those months occurred after the DNA test results.
His wife, Donna Zinetti, was discovered in October 1999 in the woods behind her apartment. She had been raped and stabbed to death while jogging, the documents state.
