The so-called "M25 Three" gang, jailed for life 10 years ago for a murder and series of robberies near the motorway, were free men last night, but without a judicial declaration of innocence.
Michael Davis, Randolph Johnson and Raphael Rowe were freed by three judges at the Court of Appeal in London who ruled that there had been a "profoundly disturbing" conspiracy to give perjured evidence between police officers and a key prosecution witness at the men's 1990 Old Bailey trial.
But Lord Justice Mantell, sitting with Mr Justice Blofeld and Mrs Justice Rafferty, stressed that the court's decision to quash the convictions as unsafe was "not a finding of innocence, far from it".
The case of the three black men, who unsuccessfully appealed in July 1993, was referred back to the Court of Appeal by the Criminal Cases Review Commission, the body responsible for the review of suspected miscarriages of justice.
They have always vigorously protested their innocence and continued to do so after being released from the cells at the Royal Courts of Justice to crowds of waiting supporters, friends and family.