A judge in Baton Rouge has ordered the immediate release of Herman Wallace, a terminally ill member of the Angola 3 who spent more than four decades in solitary confinement in Louisiana's prisons.

A judge in Baton Rouge has ordered the immediate release of Herman Wallace, a terminally ill member of the Angola 3 who spent more than four decades in solitary confinement in Louisiana's prisons.

Because there were no women on the jury, District Judge Brian A. Jackson said in his ruling that the former Black Panther and New Orleans native did not receive a fair trial for the 1972 stabbing murder of an Angola prison guard. Nearly 40 years after his conviction, Jackson vacated the grand jury indictment and ordered Wallace's release.

But the state could, and will, attempt to block his release. Although Jackson's ruling overturns Wallace's conviction, the state has 30 days to notify the courts that they plan to re-indict him. 
"I have the utmost respect for Judge Jackson. We respectfully disagree with his decision," Baton Rouge District Attorney Hillar Moore said Tuesday after the ruling. His office is currently in the process of filing an appeal with the 5th Circuit Court and will ask both Jackson and the circuit court to delay Wallace's release until the appeal is heard.

Jackson's ruling was in response to a writ of habeas corpus Wallace filed claiming that he did not receive a fair trial and was therefore being held illegally by the state. Earlier this month, a magistrate judge recommended that Jackson strike down Wallace's writ, but Jackson decided Tuesday to go in the opposite direction.

"The record in this case makes clear that Mr. Wallace's grand jury was improperly chosen in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of the equal protection of the laws...and that the Louisiana courts, when presented with the opportunity to correct this error, failed to do so," Jackson's ruling read.

It is unclear whether Wallace will survive much longer if he is released. He was diagnosed with advanced liver cancer earlier this year and recently said he only has a few months to live. Kendall and Nick Trenticosta, another lawyer acting on behalf of Wallace and his fellow Angola 3 members, said it's probably more a matter of weeks, not months.

Wallace's legal team said litigation into his "unconstitutional confinement in solitary...for four decades" will continue. Wallace along with fellow Black Panther Albert Woodfox were both implicated in the savage stabbing death of Angola prison guard Brent Miller in the early 1970s.
Amnesty International Executive Director Steven W. Hawkins said he was happy with Jackson's ruling, but added,

 "tragically, this step toward justice has come as Herman is dying from cancer with only days or hours left to live. No ruling can erase the cruel, inhuman and degrading prison conditions he endured for more than 41 years."