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A Tulsa man is expected to be freed from prison after being wrongfully convicted of first-degree murder. Willard O’Neal was sentenced to life without parole in 2004 for the 2001 killing of a strip club owner in Tulsa and the attempted murder of the owner's bodyguard. The Oklahoma Innocence Project at the Oklahoma City University School of Law has been working to free O’Neal since 2015, when it filed its first appeal asking the court to overturn his sentence and release him. According to an Innocence Project news release, the sole evidence tying O’Neal to the murder was the “fabricated testimony” of the prosecution’s main witness, who received a plea deal in exchange. In 2016, the Innocence Project filed a request with the court to have some of the crime scene evidence tested for DNA. Last year, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation cleared O’Neal through DNA testing. On Wednesday, prosecutors agreed to release O’Neal with time served and a plea of second-degree murder. The plea agreement hearing will take place today. O’Neal should be released immediately afterward, according to the Innocence Project. “We are incredibly happy that Willard’s long journey to freedom has ended today. He is now a free man. It would not have been possible without the hard work of so many OCU law students who have been working on his case since 2015. Their dedication to review and investigate Willard’s case has resulted in his walk to freedom today. We will continue to work on behalf of all Oklahomans who have been wrongfully convicted,” said Vicki Behenna, executive director emeritus of the Innocence Project.