Thursday, December 25, 2003
His release had been planned for Tuesday night, but the deal between his attorneys and Tom Keith, Forsyth County's district attorney, had collapsed.
So Darryl Hunt was a bit skeptical as he signed the papers required for his release just after 11 yesterday morning.
His conviction in the murder of Deborah Sykes wasn't overturned yet. And no one had apologized for putting him away for a crime that he has always said he didn't commit.
"I was signing it thinking, 'They're going to come and snatch it back,'" he said.
April Hunt was trying to arrange to visit her husband in jail when his attorney called and told her he was going to be released after all.
She collected the clothes that she would need for her husband - the new black leather jacket and a borrowed sport coat, just in case the jacket didn't fit - and drove over to the Forsyth County Jail at Second and Church streets in downtown Winston-Salem to wait.
Inside, Darryl Hunt changed from a white prison uniform into the new slacks and shirt.
At 11:50 a.m., he walked slowly down the corridor that leads from the release area to the front desk in the jail.
He heard the chants.
"Darryl Hunt is free. Darryl Hunt is free. Darryl Hunt is free."
He met his wife first, lifting her off the ground in a long, quiet embrace.
"Darryl Hunt is free," the men who have supported him for almost 20 years continued chanting. "Darryl Hunt is free."
"Yes. Yes. Yes," said Larry Little, a former city alderman, holding Hunt in his arms.
"It's a long time coming, man," said James Ferguson, the Charlotte lawyer who defended Hunt at his second trial in 1990.
The television cameras were waiting for him outside.
"I think justice will take its course, God willing," Hunt said. "I always had faith that one day I would be free."
Outside, a friend waited to take him to the Community Mosque of Winston-Salem on Waughtown Street.
Inside the van, his wife stroked his hand and rubbed his back. Hunt said he felt calmer.
Little handed him the judge's order for his release and pointed to Paragraph 11. That was the one that said Willard E. Brown had confessed to murdering Sykes, that he had acted alone, and that Hunt was not involved. And that he was sorry for what he had done to Hunt.
"This pretty much seals it," Little said.
It was 12:15. Hunt had been a free man for 20 minutes, and was at a loss for words.
"Does the jacket fit?" April Hunt asked.
The couple spoke so quietly to each other that no one else in the van could hear. They were married in prison three years ago, and she had always told her husband that if she didn't get to be with him in this life, she would wait until the next.
"I believe it now," she said.
He arrived at the mosque just in time for the second prayer of the day.
"I never gave up faith that one day I would be here," Hunt told the other men gathered for prayer. "It's just been a tough road."
Nearby, people had been gathering since 9:30 at Emmanuel Baptist Church on Shalimar Drive, John Mendez, one of the founders of the Darryl Hunt Defense Committee, is pastor at Emmanuel Baptist.
Hunt arrived at 12:45 p.m.
Again, the cheers went up. "Darryl Hunt is free. Darryl Hunt is free."
Inside, people sang the old hymn, "Victory is Mine."
A table was set up for Hunt, his wife and the core members of the defense committee: Mark Rabil, the lawyer who has handled his case for 19 years; Little, the former alderman; Khalid Griggs, the imam at the mosque and April's father; Mendez; Carlton Eversley, the pastor at Dellabrook Presbyterian Church; and Nelson Malloy, a member of the Winston-Salem City Council .
Once, Hunt had written down words that he would read upon his release. That was in 1994, when he expected to be set free after DNA testing ruled him out as the source of the semen taken from Sykes. But a judge turned him down then, saying that the weight of the eyewitness testimony still pointed at him.
This time, Hunt didn't need notes.
He spoke from his heart, finding a story that told what each person seated with him had meant to him.
"I want to start out with Larry," he said, struggling to compose himself.
"Take your time Darryl, it's all right," someone called from the audience.
"He asked me was I innocent? Did I do the crime? And I told him, 'No,'" Hunt said, recalling his meeting with Little the day after his arrest in September 1984.
"He said, 'If you didn't I will fight for you, but if you did I will fight against you.'
"It was that that helped me feel at peace and he has been with me through these 19 years," Hunt continued. "He is a blessing from God because at that point when I was arrested they probably could have shot me and gotten it over with and there wouldn't have been nothing said. The hell that I experienced the first couple of days, but after Larry became interested I was a little more at peace. I felt a little bit better, safer is the word I'm looking for."
Hunt spoke for more than half an hour about his disappointments, the courage that he has found in friendship, the strength that he has found in his wife's love, and his faith.
And when it over, he went home.
It was 2:10 p.m.
He and April walked into the house that he had seen only in pictures and shut the door.
• Phoebe Zerwick can be reached at 727-7291 or at pzerwick@wsjournal.com