USA - Pennsylvania. Raymond Johnson, who spent 9 years on death row, has been resentenced to 10 years in prison

Raymond Johnson, who spent 9 years on death row, has been resentenced to 5 years to 123 months in prison after a judge concluded that his trial attorneys were ineffective, and the only eyewitness was not credible because he was later convicted of another murder. 42-year-old Johnson had been convicted and sentenced to die in a September 2000 trial for the June 18, 1996 1st-degree murder of 29-year-old rival drug dealer Louis Combs. But after Judge Stephen Lieberman granted Johnson a new trial, the defendant pleaded guilty Friday to 3rd-degree murder and received the lesser sentence. Johnson, who could be released in less than 3 months, told the court that he was "very grateful." Assistant District Attorney Alisa Hobart said 31-year-old prosecution witness Jackie Cook Jr. initially testified that he saw Johnson commit the murder. But Cook later recanted and is now serving life for the March 2001 murder of Ernesto Galarza-Soler, so prosecutors could not retry Johnson's case.