https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5767403/Stacey-Abrams-sister-marrying-wrongly-convicted-man-incarcerated-27-years.html
PUBLISHED: 12:37 EST, 24 May 2018 | UPDATED: 13:48 EST, 24 May 2018
EXCLUSIVE: Sister of Stacey Abrams -America's first black female gubernatorial nominee - is marrying a man who spent 27 years in prison for rape and robberies he didn't commit - and she is a JUDGE!
Once an aspiring baseball player Jimmie Gardner was released from a prison in West Virginia in 2016, after being wrongly convicted of sex assault and robbery
The 51-year-old has found love with Georgia District Judge Leslie Abrams - the sister of the woman who became the country's first black female gubernatorial nominee earlier this week
In May 1987, a mother and daughter were robbed, beaten, and the latter raped at their home in Charleston
Police interviewed all of the black players on the Charleston Wheelers, including Gardner, as part of their investigation.
'I give fingerprints, pubic hairs, saliva, blood samples, I mean, what have I got to hide? I'm then immediately arrested and charged with nine counts from two separate offenses,' Gardner told DailyMail.com
Fred Zain, a forensic expert at the West Virginia State criminal lab, claimed Garner's samples matched blood from the crime scenes years after the incidents
Three years later, Gardner learned that all of Zain's cases involving DNA were being reviewed after it was discovered that he had falsified evidence
It took decades to have his case heard and be released from a West Virginia prison - after which he became a motivational speaker to help others
On the night of Stacey Abram's victory against Stacey Evans, Gardner and the candidate's younger sister Leslie were right by her side in Atlanta
By CHRIS WHITE FOR DAILYMAIL.COM