Man Possibly Coerced Into Murder Confession Freed

An Idaho man who experts say was coerced into a false murder confession is now free after spending half of his life behind bars, the AP reports. An eastern Idaho judge released Christopher Tapp on Wednesday after vacating his rape conviction and resentencing him to time served for the 1996 murder of Angie Dodge. The release came after years of work by advocates including Judges for Justice, the Idaho Innocence Project, and the victim's mother, Carol Dodge.

Angie Dodge was 18 and living in an Idaho Falls apartment on June 13, 1996, when she was sexually assaulted and murdered at her home. Tapp was a 20-year-old high school dropout at the time, and was interrogated for hours and subjected to multiple lie detector tests by police. He eventually confessed, but DNA evidence taken from the scene didn't match Tapp or any of the other suspects in the case. (More Idaho stories.)