NEW YORK (AP) After serving nearly 24 years in prison before being granted clemency and starring in last years movie Sing Sing , Jon-Adrian JJ Velazquez has officially been exonerated of a murder prosecutors now say he didnt commit.

A Manhattan judge on Monday vacated the 48-year-olds wrongful conviction in the killing of retired New York City police officer Albert Ward during a robbery in 1998.

Outside of court, Velazquez donned a cap with the phrase End of an Error and he and his mother raised their hands in victory. He told reporters he considered himself a lucky man that so many people believed in him over the years.

But Velazquez said he also wondered if he was free only because of the notoriety of his case, which has been the subject of a documentary, podcasts, a movie and a book.

We should not have a system where its so much easier to imprison the poor than it is to free the innocent, he said. It has always been this way, but it doesnt have to be, because we deserve better.