$3.4 million paid for wrongful conviction

BOSTON, July 15 (UPI) -- A Massachusetts town and five of its insurers have agreed to pay $3.4 million to the estate of a man wrongfully imprisoned for a murder he didn't commit.

The civil rights lawsuit filed against the town of Ayer by the estate of the late Kenneth Waters had been scheduled to go to trial in federal court next week, the Boston Globe reported Wednesday.

Waters spent more than 18 years in prison for the slaying and armed robbery of Katharina Brow, who was found stabbed to death in her mobile home in Ayer in May 1980.

He was freed from prison and charges against him were dropped in March 2001 after DNA evidence cleared him of the killing.

Waters died six months later after suffering a fall while on his way to a restaurant.

His sister, Betty Anne Waters, says she spent half her life working to free her brother.

Her efforts are the subject of a recently completed movie starring Academy Award winner Hilary Swank.