Man dies after murder, rape convictions overturned

ST. LOUIS -- A funeral has been held for a St. Louis man who had four years of freedom after the reversal of the rape and murder convictions that sent him to prison for nearly three decades.

The funeral for 60-year-old George Allen Jr. was held Wednesday. His family found him dead of natural causes in his bedroom Oct. 16, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

"I prayed and cried for 29 years for God to let me see my son walk out of that prison," said Allen's mother, Lonzetta Taylor. "I thought I would pass before him. I never dreamed he would pass first."

Allen was released from prison Nov. 14, 2012, after a judge threw out the convictions in the 1982 death of 31-year-old Mary Bell.

Bell, a court reporter, was attacked and killed in her St. Louis apartment.

Allen was walking in Bell's neighborhood over a month after her death when police arrested him because he resembled a convicted sex offender who was a suspect in the case.

The judge ruled St. Louis police misled the mentally ill man into a false confession and hid or destroyed evidence casting doubt on his guilt.

Allen served 29 years of a 95-year sentence. He could have received the death penalty, but a juror needed to leave during the trial's penalty phase.

"The man was picked up six weeks after the crime, walking while black -- that was his only crime," said Tom Block, a death-penalty opponent who counseled prisoners. "There's no question about his innocence."

Taylor said Allen graduated from University City High School, worked as a laborer for a construction business and was in the Army briefly.

While Allen's family believes his paranoid schizophrenia set in during his early 20s, he was not diagnosed until prison.

Allen's death came as a surprise to some, because it didn't seem as if he had any health issues.

Although there was no autopsy, doctors said he apparently died of liver disease and high blood pressure.

Taylor has set up a fundraising website to seek donations to help cover funeral costs and also is seeking compensation for unfair treatment from the St. Louis Police Department in a federal lawsuit.

"We're not promised anything in this life," Allen's sister, Elfrieda Allen, said. "We have to be thankful that we did get four years with him. I'm thankful that he survived through it all and walked out of there alive."