One of five men sent to prison for the rape and murder of a middle school classmate two decades ago walked out of an Illinois prison Friday, exonerated by new DNA evidence that also has cleared at least two of the others, including his half-brother.

James Harden, now 36, stood outside the walls of Menard Correctional Center in Chester and said the taste of freedom was “like breathing new life in my body.”

His half-brother, Jonathan Barr, will have to wait while paperwork related to a decades-old juvenile conviction is worked out, his attorney said.

A judge on Thursday vacated the convictions of Harden, Barr and another man, Robert Taylor, after DNA evidence pointed to another suspect. Taylor was released Thursday from Stateville Correctional Center in Joliet.

The other two, Robert Lee Veal and Shainne Sharp, served shorter sentences that ended years ago for the rape and shooting death of 14-year-old Cateresa Matthews in 1991 in Dixmoor, Ill.

Prosecutors say they plan to ask those convictions be vacated as well.