Kevin Strickland

The attorney general's job is to seek justice, not to defend prior convictions, Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker told KCUR. "They exploited these victims again," Peters Baker said of Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt's office.

"The Court's confidence in Strickland's conviction is so undermined that it cannot stand," the judge wrote. Strickland's wrongful imprisonment for nearly 43 years is among the country's longest.