Richey: 'I've considered suicide'

Richey returned to Scotland last week after years in jail in the US

Kenny Richey has told BBC Scotland that he spent his first days of freedom at home in Scotland contemplating whether to take his own life.

In an interview, the 43-year-old said he had considered suicide more since his release from prison than in his 21 years spent on death row in the US.

Richey was freed after a plea deal with prosecutors over an arson attack in which a two-year-old girl died.

The former convict said he felt like he "didn't fit" in the outside world.

Richey, who left Edinburgh aged 18 to live with his American father in Ohio, said the city that he had known was no longer there.

I just feel like I'm not a part of anything and it breaks my heart Kenny Richey

"So much has changed," he said. "Even the scenery."

He added that his future was going to be "very difficult" to deal with.

"It's going to be hard for me to adjust back into society. This is a society that has grown up without me," he said.

"I was left behind, essentially, and it feels like I'm still stuck in 1986."

Richey said that all he had been able to live with for 21 years were memories and that those thoughts were what had kept him going.

'An embarrassment'

But despite having been faced with the electric chair in the past, he said his fight to keep living had only just begun.

He added that suicide had been in his thoughts during his first few days out of prison.

"It's like I don't belong in this time period - everything has changed, people have changed, everyone has moved on," he said.

"I just feel like I'm not a part of anything and it breaks my heart."

Richey said he could never have harmed Cynthia Collins

Reflecting on his conviction over the death of two-year-old Cynthia Collins in an arson attack, Richey again insisted he was innocent.

When asked why he had not earlier accepted a plea bargain which would have seen him only serve 10 years in prison, he replied: "Because they wanted me to plead guilty and I didn't do anything."

He added that the prosecutors he eventually did reach an agreement with knew he was innocent but "just wouldn't admit it".

Richey said: "They don't want the US judicial system to look bad, they don't want to make themselves look bad. It would have been an embarrassment."

He added that he was angry and bitter about what had happened.

"They took 21-and-a-half years of my life for something I didn't do, of course I'm bitter. Who wouldn't be?"