On February 1, 1986, a young woman, Donna Givens, was leaving a Savannah nightclub in the early hours of the morning.
She identified Echols as the man who held her down during the rape (this identification may have been based on suggestive ID procedures by the police including photo displays[1]).
The 5’3" Echols endured violent, and often sexual, assaults from others in prison including being stabbed with a screwdriver.
The Innocence Project agreed to take on his case and, in February 2001, finally got permission to do DNA testing on the rape kit evidence.
In July 2001, extensive DNA testing of Echols and co-defendant Samuel Scott showed that they could not have contributed the spermatozoa from the vaginal swabs.
[3] Finally, in October 2002, Echols and Scott became the second and third Georgia prisoners to be exonerated and the charges of rape were lifted.
Although he had been allowed to move to Mississippi to set up a home remodelling business, he had not reported to his parole officer for two years and an arrest warrant was issued.
Finally, in 2002, Echols was cleared of the charges which had ruined the previous sixteen years of his life.