exonerations

The blast that happened at the Port Chicago Naval Magazine in California killed 320 people and injured 400 more.

Glynn Simmons, 71, was released in July after prosecutors agreed that key evidence in his case was not turned over to his defense lawyers. He is the longest imprisoned U.S. inmate to be exonerated.

The men, whose confessions conflicted with evidence at the scene, were cleared in the 1995 killing of a clerk who was set on fire in a New York subway toll booth.

"I've been always dreaming of this. For this day," said Alfred Chestnut, now 52. The Maryland men were freed after investigators found police and prosecutorial misconduct in the 1983 case.

Mark Schand spent nearly 30 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit. He considers the vindication more important than the money.

Last year, 139 wrongfully convicted inmates were exonerated. That's a drop from 2016, when there were 171 cases, data from the National Registry of Exonerations shows.

More than half of the 52 people exonerated of murder last year in the U.S. were black, an annual report found. The number of people exonerated also hit a record high for the third year in a row.

A judge agreed to vacate Christopher Abernathy's 1987 conviction in the killing of a 15-year-old girl after a request from the prosecutor. Abernathy, now 48, spent nearly 30 years in prison.

The National Registry of Exonerations says 125 people were exonerated in 2014 after being falsely convicted of crimes. The number surpasses the previous record of 91 set in 2013.