Final 'Norfolk 4' suspect released Fri.

On Thursday evening two of the three "Norfolk Four" sailors were released from the Sussex Correctional Facility in Waverly. The third person pardoned is set to be released on Friday.

Thursday afternoon, Governor Tim Kaine announced he granted a conditional pardon to the three members of the "Norfolk Four" still imprisoned for the 1997 rape and murder of a Norfolk teenager, Michelle Moore-Bosko.

This means the convictions of the so-called "Norfolk Four" will stand, but the men will all be released from prison because the Governor does not believe there is enough evidence to keep them behind bars.

WAVY.com was there as two of the four men left Sussex State Prison with their families, never looking back at the place they'd stayed for so long. Just moments after she reunited with her son, Rachel Tice said, "I'm overjoyed that Derek is here standing here with me and we're not sitting inside Sussex 2." Rachel Tice was hoping for a full pardon, though. "Derek is totally innocent and we will keep fighting until we get our pardon," she told WAVY.com.

Joseph Dick, Jr., Derek Tice and Danial Williams' attorneys held a news conference after the Governor's announcement and said they and the suspects' families are very upset Governor Kaine did not grant full pardons. A fourth suspect, Eric Wilson, was released in 2006 after serving eight years for the rape conviction.

During a news conference, Governor Kaine said, "They have raised grave doubts about the level of their involvement" in the crime. He added, "I have wrestled with the multiple confessions these men made to different people at different times and the careful apology Joseph Dick made in court to the family. But I am the only person now that has looked at all of the evidence in all four cases... I think the men have demonstrated any involvement they had is significantly lesser than Omar Ballard's, the primary perpertrator of this crime... This has been a challenging matter, but I think we got it right."

The victim's mother, Carol Moore, told WAVY.com she cried when she heard the news. "We are devastated. Those men raped and killed my daughter and they are going to be out free and breathing the air and my daughter is dead."

In a written response to the news, John and Carol Moore said, "We do not believe it is a coincidence that Governor Kaine granted these pardons just a few weeks after the announcement that John Grisham intends to write a screenplay about this case. Stories about rapists and murderers who confess, then spend the rest of their lives in prison, do not make interesting movies."

Derek Tice, Danial Williams, Joseph Dick, Jr. and Eric Wilson were all convicted for their roles in the rape and murder of 18-year-old Michelle Moore-Bosko in her Ocean View apartment in Norfolk, after all four sailors confessed to the crime and pleaded guilty.  But later, the sailors said they were forced to make the confessions.

In 2005, a Washington D.C. law firm representing the "Norfolk Four" petitioned then Governor Mark Warner for clemency on behalf of the sailors, claiming Norfolk homicide investigators coerced the men into confessing. The detectives on the case maintain to this day that they did not in any way force the sailors to confess. Governor Warner left office without making a decision, passing the case to Governor Kaine when he took office.

In response to Governor Kaine's decision to grant Williams, Tice and Dick conditional pardons, Attorney General Bill Mims said, "The Office of the Attorney General has represented the interests of the Commonwealth and sought justice, as we are bound to do by law, and vigorously defended the multiple convictions of these individuals." He continued, “I have the utmost respect for Governor Kaine and am confident his decision was made with great care.”