BEIJING - A MAN in central China was awarded one million yuan (S$209,429) and declared innocent of rape 27 years after being unjustly convicted and jailed for the crime, state press said on Thursday.

Following orders from the high court of Henan province, a local county court retried Zhang Baoyin in August and found him innocent of raping a woman in 1982, China National Radio reported.

Zhang was convicted of the rape based on police evidence that his blood type matched that of blood found at the scene of the crime and sentenced to 10 years in jail despite his pleas of innocence, the report said.

After being released from prison for good behavior in 1989, Zhang began his quest to clear his name and by 1996 proved that the blood type of the evidence collected by police was type O, while his blood type was AB, the report said.

Despite such findings, Henan local courts refused to overturn the 1982 conviction, it said. Finally, in June 2008, the case went before the Henan high court, which ordered the retrial.

On August 24, Zhang was declared innocent and the court awarded him 1.02 million yuan in compensation, it said. -- AFP