One cold January night in 1977, David Goodwin went to the beach for business.

Goodwin had been hired to unload bales of marijuana from a boat anchored at a Florida beach, and haul the bales of weed onto waiting trucks. Goodwin didn’t know he was walking into an FBI trap. And he never imagined that shortly after showing up, four bystanders would be killed — and that he would be convicted of their murders despite being nearly 150 miles away when the shots were fired.

Now after nearly 40 years in prison, including a stint on death row, Goodwin is going free. The 70-year-old inmate was granted parole this month and is scheduled to leave Everglades Correctional Institute in Miami, Florida on May 2.