PHOENIX -- The city of Phoenix has agreed to pay $3 million to settle a lawsuit filed by a man who was twice wrongfully convicted of murder, officials said.

It's the second settlement Ray Krone has received this year. In April, Maricopa County agreed to pay him $1.4 million.

"I'm just glad for it to be over," said Krone, who spent more than a decade behind bars, including two years on death row. "I hope I won't ever need lawyers again."

The Phoenix City Council approved the settlement last week, said city spokeswoman Toni Maccarone. Neither the city nor county admitted wrongdoing by settling, according to lawyers in the case.

Krone was a postal worker when he was arrested in 1991 in the killing of Kim Ancona, a bartender who worked at a Phoenix lounge where Krone played darts.

He was convicted in 1992, based largely on expert testimony that supposedly matched his teeth with bite marks found on the victim.

His conviction was overturned two years later on procedural grounds. A new trial was ordered, and Krone was convicted a second time.

But the judge in the second trial said he wasn't sure that Krone was the killer. He spared Krone the death penalty, instead sentencing him to life in prison.

In 2002, DNA testing proved Krone wasn't the killer. Instead, DNA from the crime scene was linked to a man already in prison for another crime. A trial for the new suspect is pending.

Krone, 48, was freed that year. He filed a wrongful conviction lawsuit, saying Phoenix police did a shoddy job of investigating the slaying and didn't look at other suspects closely enough.

Besides his mental anguish, Krone said he sued Arizona agencies for physical pain and suffering. He said he was stabbed, had his arm broken and contracted hepatitis C while in Arizona prisons.

Krone lives in Dover Township, Pa., near his family. He's spent the past few years traveling, speaking out against the death penalty and advocating DNA testing. He also serves on the Commission on Safety and Abuse in America's Prisons.

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Rick Brand
POLITICS & POWER