USA - Tennessee. Gaile Owens, 58, white, who spent 26 years on death row, was released today

Gaile Owens, 58, white, who spent 26 years on death row, was released today and greeted by a small group of supporters outside Tennessee's Prison for Women. She was sentenced to die for hiring a stranger to kill her husband in 1985, but her death sentence was commuted to life in prison last year. She won parole last week (see Sept. 28). The first thing she did on leaving the prison was hug one of her sons, Stephen Owens, who is now grown and has children of his own. When he commuted her sentence to life in prison last year, former Gov. Phil Bredesen said prosecutors had agreed not to seek the death penalty if Owens pleaded guilty but then put her on trial when her co-defendant wouldn't accept the plea bargain. At the time she was imprisoned, a life sentence meant serving 30 years. She was eligible to be released now because of good conduct.