The district attorney's office grudgingly gave up the case four months after a federal appeals court ruled that Goldstein had been wrongfully convicted of shotgunning John McGinest to death in Long Beach on Nov. 3, 1979. The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals also ruled that Goldstein should be immediately released. State and local officials, however, did not comply with the order, leading to a criminal investigation that is now pending in Los Angeles federal court.

Goldstein's attorneys said they were pleased at the outcome but both expressed disgust that Goldstein had been imprisoned for so long on such thin evidence, even after the five federal judges had ruled that his constitutional rights had been seriously violated. Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley's office re-charged Goldstein, contending that they had a strong case that never materialized. "They had nothing. No fingerprints. No forensic evidence. No gun," said Rubin. "This was nothing but pure, outrageous false imprisonment," Linder said.

In continuing to push the case the past four months, the district attorney's office engaged in "display of prosecutorial chutzpah nearly equal to the mendacity it employed to secure the defendant's original conviction," Lindner said outside the courtroom.