Update: Onetime Pro Football Prospect Exonerated of Rape

Updated with Long Beach Unified School District comment.

A judge Thursday overturned the rape conviction of a former Long Beach Poly High School football star and prized college recruit, whose accuser recanted her story after he served more than five years behind bars.

Brian Banks, now 26, sobbed after Long Beach Superior Court Judge Mark C. Kim granted the defense's motion to throw out his 2003 conviction for forcible rape involving a girl on the campus of Long Beach Polytechnic High School a year earlier. He said Thursday that he had verbally accepted a scholarship offer to play for the USC Trojans.

``My only dream in the world was to just be free and to have the same opportunity as everybody here,'' said Banks, wearing a black sweatshirt with the word ``Innocent'' on it. He'd burst into tears after the judge's ruling, the AP reported.``I feel like anything is possible,'' he said.

``It's proven today by me getting my freedom back. I feel like this is just the first step to re- inventing my life, so the sky is the limit for me.''

Brentford Ferreira, who heads the unit in the District Attorney's Office that deals with post-trial motions, said after the hearing, ``It's not our job to maintain a conviction at any cost. It's our job to do justice and (in) this case, we believed the recantation of the witness. We do not believe Mr. Banks did the crime that he pled (no contest) to, and, therefore justice has been served.''

Banks -- who was released from prison five years ago -- said Thursday that he was ``really shocked and at a loss for words'' when his accuser, Wanetta Gibson, contacted him last year. In one of the odder twists to this story, Gibson reached out to Banks on Facebook and eventually was willing to change her story but worried about having to pay back what she called a very large civil court settlement from LBUSD.

Asked Thursday whether Long Beach Unified School District would seek to get back what has been reported as a sizable settlement paid under now-false pretense, LBUSD spokesman Chris Eftychiou said, "The school district cannot comment, due to the confidential nature of a matter that involved minors."

Justin Brooks, director of the California Innocence Project, said the petition ``was based on the new evidence that showed his innocence and the new evidence was the recantation statement by the alleged victim in this case.'' The attorney noted that his client has ``spent 10 years of his life with this hanging over his head'' -- five years in prison and five years dealing with the life of a convicted sex offender required to wear an ankle monitor that will now be taken off.

It is the first time in which the California Innocence Project has taken on a case involving someone who has already finished their sentence, Brooks said.

``Finally justice is done in this case,'' he said, calling the hearing the ``shortest and greatest proceeding I have ever been a part of.'' Banks was 16 when he was accused of rape on July 8, 2002, and 17 when he pleaded no contest to forcible rape in exchange for a six-year sentence -- considerably shorter than the 41-year-to-life term he could have faced if he had gone to trial and been convicted.

``We've learned sometimes innocent people confess and sometimes innocent people plead their cases out,'' Brooks said, adding that ``our sentences are so harsh.'' Banks -- who had tears welling up in his eyes shortly after his conviction was vacated -- said he does not hold any anger against the woman who accused him of rape.

``If I was to sit here and be angry, I probably wouldn't be here today because I would have lashed out when I had the opportunity, when she first reached out to me,'' he said. ``There comes a time when you have to let go in order to move on. The only thing I wasn't going to let go was this fight.''

Banks' accuser sued the Long Beach Unified School District, alleging that lax security led to the attack, and received a $1.5 million settlement, according to the Innocence Project. Banks, a middle linebacker who had been offered a ``full-ride scholarship'' by the University of Southern California, said he has been training six days a week since last October ``in hopes of giving football another try.''

His attorney pleaded for National Football League executives to ``give this guy a shot,'' calling him ``the most determined individual I've ever met.''

Banks, once a star middle linebacker at Poly, had attracted the interest of such college football powerhouses as the University of Southern California, Ohio State University and the University of Michigan, according to the website Rivals.com, which tracks the recruiting of high school football and basketball players.

Banks told reporters after the hearing that he had verbally agreed to attend USC before his arrest.

--TERRI VERMEULEN KEITH, City News Service