Man convicted of raping bestselling author exonerated after film producer finds inconsistencies

A man convicted of raping best-selling author Alice Sebold 40 years ago was exonerated

Anthony Broadwater, who spent 16 years in prison, was cleared Monday by a judge of raping Sebold when she was a student at Syracuse University, an assault she wrote about in her 1999 memoir, "Lucky." The memoir preceded Sebold’s book, "The Lovely Bones," which became a bestseller after its release in 2002 and was later made into a movie. 

The exoneration comes after a producer working on a film adaptation of the memoir became skeptical that Broadwater was a guilty man. Initial media reports stated the adaptation of "Lucky" was a Netflix project, but the streaming and production company said it is not involved in the project.