Wrongfully convicted Ohioan awaits $45 million federal lawsuit payment

The township appealed the settlement and in May 2025, a three-judge panel of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with Gillispie and declined to lower the amount. Gillispie told the Enquirer he’s tired of waiting for compensation.

Since Gillispie’s release he’s been active volunteering and speaking in support of activities to free the wrongfully convicted. He has spoken at national symposiums about how he managed the marking of time for more than two decades behind bars for something he didn’t do.

Gillispie managed time through art and his work has been featured in several media publications He used discarded items to make scenes he dreamed about. 

One striking example included making a model of his vision of traveling the legendary Route 66 highway crisscrossing America. One scene he constructed included a toaster-size trailer with a propane tank no bigger than your thumb during his incarceration. 

Gillispie spread cigarette-pack foil across notebook cardboard, and used pins taken from the prison sewing shop to hold the whole structure together. The window curtains, made from used tea bags, are partially closed. A tiny sign on the trailer door reads, in nearly microscopic ink script: "gone fishing."

Read the Cincinnati Enquirer story online.

Learn more about Dean’s Gillispie case online.

Find out more about the work of the Ohio Innocence Project online.

Featured top image courtesy of Istock.