Man wrongly convicted of murder in 1989 reacts to release of confessed killer

CRANSTON, R.I. (WJAR) — Todd Barry, the man who confessed to the brutal murder of a 29-year-old Rhode Island woman in 1989, was released from prison on Wednesday.

WJAR spoke exclusively with Scott Hornoff, who was wrongfully imprisoned for the same murder.

Hornoff, a former police officer, spent six years in the Rhode Island Department of Corrections for a crime he did not commit.

Twenty-two years after his release, he said, the memories still haunt him.

“When I'm awake, I don't really think about it. I still have nightmares almost every night,” he said. “About being in prison, or being told I'm going to prison, or escaping or being followed.”

On August 11, 1989, Victoria Cushman was brutally murdered in her home in Warwick.

Hornoff, a married police officer and Cushman's lover, was arrested, tried and found guilty of the crime.

“I was sentenced to life imprisonment and would have served it because I would never have confessed to something I did not do,” he said.

Hornoff spent six years in prison before Barry came forward. Hornoff said he wrote to him in hopes of understanding the evidence and finding out what drove him to let an innocent man take the blame.

Barry's release on Wednesday ended his 20-year prison sentence, but Hornoff's wounds are far from healed.

“I'm still a little angry because I know my mother would have lived a lot longer if this hadn't happened,” he said.

Hornoff said he hasn't heard from Barry in years and has no plans to contact him, but he is willing to meet with him if the opportunity arises.