Christopher Tapp

Ken Brown, who's retired, did not respond to our questions about Chris Tapp's exoneration or about the failure to collect Drip's DNA.

And Jarrett Furman, the former mayor, died from Alzheimer's a year after Drip's was sent to prison.

He was 60 years old.

As for the fully exonerated, actually innocent Chris Tapp, what word would he use to describe himself after all he's been through?

I've been a little lucky.

Yeah.

It's really amazing, isn't it?

I mean, you were a pariah.

You were that drug-addled bad kid from the riverbank who, with his bad friends, did this terrible thing.

It was nice for people to finally see the truth.

And once he was out, Chris Tapp became a bit of an activist.

In 2021, he watched as Idaho's governor signed a law providing compensation for the wrongfully convicted.

The law provided Chris more than a million dollars.

He lobbied for similar laws in other states.

And he filed a lawsuit against the city of Idaho Falls and its police department.

Chris settled it for an apology from City Hall.

and $11.7 million.

I had talked to Chris often through the years, found him rather, well, sweet.

the kid who loved his mother and his old friends, and for whom there might finally be a storybook ending.

But, no, this wasn't that kind of story.