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JEFFERSON, Mo. — Attorney General Kris Koster announced Tuesday his office will not retry or pursue further action against Ryan Ferguson at this time following the appellate court’s review of the case.
Ferguson was serving a 40-year prison sentence after being convicted for the murder and robbery of Columbia Daily Tribune sports editor Kent Heitholt in 2005. Heitholt was found strangled outside of the newspaper’s offices on November 1, 2001.
Ferguson has spent nearly a decade behind bars for the murder, which he claims he did not commit. Earlier in November, the Western District of the Missouri Court of Appeals vacated Ferguson’s second-degree murder and first-degree robbery convictions.
Ferguson’s release date is pending.
