NORFOLK, Va. (WAVY) — After multiple attempts over two decades, a judge granted Arsean Hicks' writ of habeas corpus Thursday afternoon and vacated his murder conviction. Corrupt ex-Norfolk detective got city pension during prison – and still is – records suggest Hicks, who was 16 at the time, was identified as the shooter in a 1999 robbery-gone-wrong that left a Navy police officer dead. He was convicted by a jury and sentenced to 80 years in May 2001. Explaining his decision from the bench, the judge acknowledged that the original case hinged on a confession Hicks had made to then-NPD Det. Glenn Ford. However, there was no forensic evidence linking Hicks to the murder weapon. Ford was later convicted of extortion and conspiracy and spent 10 years in federal prison. Many of the cases he worked on have since been called into question, with allegations of witness manipulation and forced confessions. "The judge, in practical terms for our client, vacated the conviction," Hicks' lead attorney, Jim Neale, said, explaining the judge's ruling outside of the courthouse. "So, Arsean's murder conviction from 2001 is no longer in place. He's still charged with that crime, and the Commonwealth will decide whether to appeal this ruling and retry him on these charges if they're successful." Hicks was seen smiling and waving to loved ones in the gallery before being led out of the courtroom after the decision was read. He had filed several similar requests for a retrial over the years he spent behind bars. The case files include dozens of pages of handwritten motions, affidavits and legal argument. Hicks has long asserted that it was one of his accomplices who pulled the trigger, and that exculpatory evidence — primarily, medical records he said showed he had been abused while in police custody — was unfairly kept from the jury. "Number one, those records were withheld when they might have helped him," Neale said. "And number two, we now know that Detective Ford at the time was engaged in some really awful criminal behavior and some really unconstitutional questioning methods of other defendants, and that was not known at the time." On the stand, a former detective who had worked with Ford described him as "loud," "gruff," "abrasive" and "known to throw things." He said the other detectives joked about Ford funneling crimeline money to his informants and brandishing, possibly weaponizing, a phone book in interrogations, in order to leverage confessions. "He impressed me; I did not admire him," the former detective told the court. He also testified that Ford requested all of the evidence used in Hicks' murder trial be destroyed, just months after it concluded. Hicks has long alleged that Ford slammed his head into a table repeatedly to make him confess. He has said in writing that photographs taken of him in police custody show abrasions to one side of his face. Neale told the judge that Hicks' original attorney had been fighting with one arm behind his back, not having knowledge of Ford's extensive wrongdoing and reputation for abuse — along with the evidence of coercion. This next time around, they're optimistic about getting a fair fight. "It means another bite at the apple," Neale told 10 On Your Side. "But importantly, from our perspective, what it would mean is that our seat would get a fair shake this time and that the judges who heard it and the jury who heard it would get to see all the evidence, including the evidence that was withheld from our seat and from his defense attorney last."