After 30 Years in Prison, Ohio Man is Compensated by the State

On Monday, the Ohio Controlling Board approved the Court of Claims request for settlement and awarded Raymond Towler $2.5 million from the state, reported the Cleveland Plain Dealer. After nearly three decades in prison for a rape he didn’t commit, Towler was exonerated in Cleveland in May 2010. 

“You can’t make up for 30 years with any amount, but I plan to keep moving forward,” Towler said in an interview with the Columbus Dispatch. “I don’t want this money to change who I am or what I become. I was lucky to find a job when I got out and I’m not going to just run out on them.”

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“I want to be smart with the money, but life is just too short to center my world around money,” Towler told the Dispatch. “Being out for a year has made me realize some of the things I missed for so long. But things happen for a reason and I have no hate for anyone.”

Towler was wrongfully convicted of raping and kidnapping a 12-year-old girl and 13-year-old boy 1981 and served 29 years of a life sentence before being released from prison.

“There’s a formula that the state uses to compensate for the state’s error, but you can’t put a price tag on the decades of his life he can’t get back,” Ohio Controlling Board member State Rep. Jay Hottinger said. “This is a way to make amends and officially apologize.”

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