Chicago, IL — Corey Batchelor and Kevin Bailey, both 48 years old, have been acquitted of murdering the wife of a retired Chicago police officer. They were claiming that they only falsely confessed because they were beaten by police.

After serving nearly 28 years of an 80-year sentence, Bailey was released from Stateville Correctional Center. Batchelor was paroled in 2004.

“Throughout the years even during my incarceration, I never, ever wanted to give up,” Batchelor said.

“I never thought it would come. Not today, not this soon,” said Keith Bailey, Kevin Bailey’s brother.

Judge Alfredo Maldonado overturned the charges for Batchelor and Bailey who were accused of the slaying of Lula Mae Woods, a wife of a retired Chicago police officer, who was found stabbed to death in her South Side Garage in 1989. Both men were 19 at the time of the arrest and neither had a criminal record.

“The evidence against Batchelor and Bailey does not meet the burden (of proof) of beyond a reasonable doubt,” special prosecutor Robert J. Milan stated after seven months of re-investigation.

Batchelor and Bailey claimed that they were beaten into making false confessions by detectives related to former Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge, who was later on fired for torturing a suspect and lying in federal court in 1993.

Recent DNA tests on a hair and a bloody towel found at the crime scene also proved them innocent.

“Today is a great day. Today is a just day. It’s a day that I thought I would never see,” Batchelor said.