A man who was convicted of rape in 1999 and sentenced to 16 years in jail because he had a tattoo that looked like that of a serial rapist has finally had his conviction upturned by a judge in the United States.
The 46-year-old Luis Lorenzo Vargas was convicted on eyewitness testimony, after many of the victims confirmed he had the same small teardrop tattoo underneath his left eyelid as a serial rapist, who police say is still at large.
Reports say the serial rapist, dubbed the ‘teardrop rapist’ because of the tattoo, has raped 39 women over the course of 20 years which started in 1995.
According to The Independent, when the judge in the Los Angeles Court told Vargas he was free to go, he burst into tears.
Vargas was freed because of new DNA evidence that proved he was not the serial rapist.
After several appeals between 1999 and 2002 were turned down, a rights group called the California Innocence Project, a programme dedicated to releasing wrongfully convicted inmates, was able to prove Vargas’ innocence.