Before the night was done, Mr. Brown, after being told that his half brother had confessed and facing similar threats that he could be executed if he did not cooperate, also signed a confession. Both men subsequently recanted at trial, saying their confessions had been coerced. The other two men mentioned in Mr. McCollum’s confession were never prosecuted. 
 
 Both defendants initially received death sentences for murder. After new trials were ordered by the State Supreme Court, Mr. McCollum was again sentenced to death, while Mr. Brown was convicted only of rape, and his sentence was reduced to life. (In later years, the Supreme Court barred the death penalty for minors and the execution of the mentally disabled.) 
 
 Lawyers from the Center for Death Penalty Litigation, working with private law firms, began pressing for DNA testing of the physical evidence in the case, which included a cigarette butt found near sticks used in the murder. 
 
 Recent DNA testing by an independent state agency, the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission, of evidence gathered in the initial investigation found a match for the DNA on the cigarette butt — not to either of the imprisoned men, but to Roscoe Artis, who lived only a block from where the victim’s body was found and who had a history of convictions for sexual assault. 
 
 Only weeks after the murder, in fact, Mr. Artis confessed to the rape and murder of an 18-year-old girl in Red Springs. Mr. Artis received a death sentence, later reduced to life, for that crime and remains in prison. Officials never explained why, despite the remarkable similarities in the crimes, they kept their focus on Mr. McCollum and Mr. Brown even as the men proclaimed their innocence. 
 
 The only witness at the hearing Tuesday was Sharon Stellato of the innocence inquiry commission, who under questioning from defense lawyers described the lack of evidence tying the two men to the crime as well as the DNA findings implicating Mr. Artis. The district attorney said he had no evidence to the contrary. 
 
 Joe Freeman Britt, the original prosecutor, told The News & Observer last week that he still believed the men were guilty. ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Henry McCollum: "I'm happy. It was a rough experience...but I knew one day I was going to be blessed to get out of prison" 
 
 Two US men who spent three decades in prison for rape and murder, one of them on death row, have been released after DNA evidence proved their innocence. 
 
 Mentally disabled half brothers Henry McCollum, 50, and Leon Brown, 46, were convicted in 1984 of raping and killing an 11-year-old girl in North Carolina. 
 
 Recently analysed DNA evidence from the crime scene implicated another man, who is in prison for a similar crime. 
 
 A county judge ordered the immediate release of the brothers. 
 
 Tuesday's court judgement followed an investigation by the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission, which tested DNA evidence found at the scene. 
 
 The commission found that none could be traced to Mr McCollum or Mr Brown. 
 
 Image copyright AP Image caption Brown confessed as a teenager after hours of interrogation by police 
 
 "This case is a tragedy which has profoundly affected not only the lives of the people involved, but which profoundly affects our system of justice in North Carolina," said lawyer for Mr Brown, Ann Kirby. 
 
 No physical evidence 
 
 The near-naked body of 11-year-old Sabrina Buie was found in 1983 near the town of Red Springs, North Carolina. She had been raped before being killed. 
 
 Mr McCollum and Mr Brown, who were 19 and 15 at the time, were picked up by police a few weeks later. There was no physical evidence connecting them to the crime. 
 
 Mr McCollum confessed after five hours of intense questioning, without a lawyer or family member present. 
 
 His younger brother also signed a confession written by the police. 
 
 The two later recanted their confessions in court, saying they were made under duress. But despite a weak case, the brothers were found guilty and given death sentences. 
 
 Mr Brown's sentence was later reduced to life in prison and his charge reduced to rape, but Mr McCollum remained on death row for three decades. 
 
 In the years since their false confessions, Mr McCollum and Mr Brown maintained their innocence and made a number of appeals. 
 
 In 2010 the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission took up their case and uncovered evidence the men's legal team had not been able to obtain. 
 
 Life lost 
 
 The evidence found no link between the brothers and the victim, but did implicate Roscoe Artis, 74, who lived close to where the victim's body was found. 
 
 Although he was not a suspect in the original case, Artis was found guilty for the rape and murder of another girl in similar circumstances less than a month after Sabrina Buie's killing. 
 
 After Tuesday's release of Mr McCollum and Mr Brown, their legal team thanked those who had worked to correct wrongs that occurred under the previous prosecutions 
 
 "It's terrifying that our justice system allowed two intellectually disabled children to go to prison for a crime they had nothing to do with, and then to suffer there for 30 years," said lawyer Ken Rose. 
 
 "It's impossible to put into words what these men have been through and how much they have lost." ||||| North Carolina’s longest-serving death row inmate and his half-brother serving a life sentence have been exonerated and released from prison after spending more than 30 years behind bars for a rape and murder they did not commit. 
 
 
 
 Robeson County superior court acted with lightning speed to free the two men, Leon Brown and Henry McCollum, who were 15 and 19 at the time of their arrest in 1983. It was testimony to the overwhelming strength of the evidence that was presented to the court that judge Douglas Sasser cleared them of the murder of 11-year-old Sabrina Buie on the first day of a hearing to consider new DNA evidence in the case. 
 
 
 
 The evidence absolved McCollum and Brown, now 46 and 50, of any link to biological material collected at the crime scene. It also found a positive match with a known sex offender from the same small town who was living just feet away from the field in which Buie’s body was found. 
 
 
 
 McCollum was held on death row throughout his three decades in prison as an innocent man. His lawyer, Ken Rose of the Center for Death Penalty Litigation in Durham, who has fought the case for the past 20 years, pointed out that both his client and Brown are diagnosed as having intellectual disabilities. 
 
 
 
 “It’s terrifying that our justice system allowed two intellectually disabled children to go to prison for a crime they had nothing to do with, and then to suffer there for 30 years. Henry watched dozens of people be hauled away for execution. He would become so distraught he had to be put in isolation. It’s impossible to put into words what these men have been through and how much they have lost.” 
 
 
 
 Co-counsel for Brown, Ann Kirby, said: “This case is a tragedy which has profoundly affected not only the lives of the people involved, but which profoundly affects our system of justice in North Carolina. This case highlights in a most dramatic manner the importance of finding the truth. Today truth has prevailed, but it comes 30 years too late for Sabrina Buie and her family, and for Leon, Henry, and their families. Their sadness, grief, and loss will remain with them forever.” 
 
 
 
 The dramatic release of the two prisoners now puts the spotlight on the police department in Red Springs, a small town in the south of the state of just 3,000 people. In court documents filed by lawyers for McCollum and Brown the police department is accused of having framed false confessions for the duo which they made the arrested teenagers sign after hours of interrogations. 
 
 
 
 Facebook Twitter Pinterest Henry McCollum sits on death row at Central Prison in Raleigh, North Carolina. Photograph: Travis Long/AP 
 
 The town’s police force is also accused of having hidden boxes of crucial evidence in its office from the time of the boys’ trial in 1984 right up to last month. The existence of the evidence, gathered at the crime scene, was never disclosed either to the boys’ defence teams or to the district attorney prosecuting the case. 
 
 
 
 The current district attorney for Robeson County, Johnson Britt, agreed on Tuesday that the two men are innocent and consented to their unconditional release. No further charges will be brought against them.
– Two mentally disabled half-brothers in North Carolina have spent the last 30 years locked up for a murder they didn't commit, DNA evidence has revealed. Leon Brown and Henry McCollum were 15 and 19 years old, respectively, in 1983 when they were arrested for the rape and murder of 11-year-old Sabrina Buie in the small town of Red Springs. Both were sentenced to death on the basis of confessions they later said were coerced, though the younger teen's sentence was later reduced to life. They were exonerated yesterday based on DNA evidence that clears them of any link to the crime scene—and implicates a known sex offender who lived just a block from where the girl's body was found, the New York Times reports. A judge declared the men, now 46 and 50, innocent and ordered them released. "It's terrifying that our justice system allowed two intellectually disabled children to go to prison for a crime they had nothing to do with, and then to suffer there for 30 years. Henry watched dozens of people be hauled away for execution," McCollum's lawyer says. "He would become so distraught he had to be put in isolation. It's impossible to put into words what these men have been through and how much they have lost." Police in Red Springs are accused not only of framing the pair, but of hiding boxes of crucial evidence until just last month, the Guardian notes. Roscoe Artis, the 74-year-old man whose DNA was found in a cigarette butt at the crime scene, is already in prison, serving a life sentence for raping and murdering an 18-year-old girl less than a month after Buie's killing, reports the BBC.