The attorney for Kevin C. Siehl, who spent 25 years in prison for the murder of his wife before his conviction was vacated in 2016, announced Monday that the Siehl estate will receive a settlement of $8.2 million, the third largest wrongful death payment in Pennsylvania history and the largest ever outside of Philadelphia County.

Siehl was arrested for the stabbing death of his estranged wife, Christine, 29, on July 14, 1991.

After being convicted of first-degree murder, he was sentenced to life without parole.

But throughout his years in prison he maintained his innocence.

He eventually filed a civil rights lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Johnstown, contending his prosecution was tainted by police and prosecutors who brought charges based on false and misleading evidence.

His post-conviction petitions had been persistently dismissed, but eventually Senior Judge David Grine of Centre County vacated his life sentence and conviction and ordered his release.

Although he was released from prison in his early 60s, Siehl was in very poor health, having suffered a heart attack while behind bars.

His heart problems resulted from the stress caused by his wrongful imprisonment, prison food and exposure to prison conditions, according to the lawsuit filed in 2018 by two Philadelphia attorneys, Jonathan H. Feinberg and Alexander Brown.

Feinberg said Monday that Siehl died in March of this year of a stroke, which was directly attributable to his heart condition.

Although Siehl is deceased, his son, Kevin Siehl II, and his daughter, Trina Jones, carried on the lawsuit.

On Monday Feinberg announced the settlement.

The defendants named in the Siehl lawsuit included: the city of Johnstown and the detectives Angelo Cancellieri and Lawrence Wagner; the Pennsylvania State Police and two investigators who processed the evidence collected at the scene of the murder, Scott Emerlick and Merrill Brant; Cambria County and the assistant district attorneys who prosecuted the case, David Tulowitzki, now a Cambria County Court judge, and Daniel Lovette.

Feinberg on Monday did not release the amounts each of the defendants have agreed to pay.

He also stated that Siehl’s family members, which in addition to his son and daughter, include two grandchildren and several great-grandchildren, would have no statements.

The accountability the settlement brings “is something they have been looking for their entire adult lives,” Feinberg reported

The settlement, however, “won’t bring back the time he (Siehl) lost with his family and community.”

He missed weddings, the birth of his grandchildren and at age 35 he went to jail and served time “during the most productive years of his adult life,” Feinberg said.

He said the settlement was a win for civil rights in general.

Feinberg said the misconduct by law enforcement in the Siehl case was “pervasive” and extended throughout the investigation, the trial and the post-conviction hearings.

He thanked the Innocence Project of New York and the Federal Public Defender’s office in Pittsburgh for their help in eventually helping to free Siehl.