A Common Pleas judge has overturned a 91-year-old murder conviction for a Glen Mills Schools teen who was executed for the crime on June 8, 1931.

The family of Alexander McClay Williams has been working to clear his name. The case was reopened after a petition was presented to Common Pleas Court President Judge Kevin F. Kelly, reports FOX 29.

The petition argued that Williams was denied his due process rights and that the conviction should be overturned.

New details in the case were introduced at a recent hearing, showing he did not commit the crime.

Williams was a 16-year-old African-American student at Glen Mills Schools, convicted of murdering 33-year-old Vida Robare, who was white. Her body was discovered by her ex-husband.

Robare was a house matron at the school. She was stabbed 47 times with an ice pick.

Williams was at the school on an unsupervised work detail when the murder took place. He was arrested Oct. 10, 1930 and charged.

He ended up confessing three times to the murder without an attorney or parent present.

An all-white jury returned a guilty verdict and Williams was executed on June 8, 1931. He is the youngest person ever executed in Pennsylvania.

“This guilty verdict was decided before the case even began,” said Sam Lemon, the great-grandson of Williams’s trial attorney.

Read more about the case at FOX 29.

Here’s the FOX 29 report announcing the overturn decision.

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