The Aaron Hernandez legal saga keeps moving the chains—even after the death of the disgraced former NFL star.
According to Yahoo Sports, a judge threw out the 2015 murder conviction of the former New England Patriot—who was serving a life sentence for murder and subsequently committed suicide in prison.
The reason? His estate argued that an old Massachusetts law should be applied in Hernandez’s case, and a Bristol Country, Massachusetts, judge agreed. The law states that “if a defendant dies while a conviction is still in the process of appeal then the verdict is vacated,” per Yahoo.
Judge Susan Garsh, who presided over the posthumous case, said “Abatement is the law in this Commonwealth and this court is required to follow that precedent….the Court has no other choice.”
At the time of his death, Hernandez, 27, was serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole for the 2013 murder of Odin Lloyd.
The decision will likely be appealed, and furthermore, make its way to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. It has important ramifications for Hernandez’s family, since the Patriots will likely now have to release owed payments that were frozen at the time of the original conviction.
In other words, this case still is going to overtime.
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