AMELIA, Ohio -- After 25 years behind bars for a crime he says he didn't commit, Gary Reece walked out of prison a free man Tuesday.

A short while later, he was settling into his new home in Amelia and adjusting to life as we know it -- the life he's missed.

"The phone was ringing before," his wife Rita said, "and he goes, 'How do you answer the telephone? I don't know how to answer the telephone.'"

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Reece was 20 when he was convicted of the rape and attempted murder of a neighbor he says he never met, News 5's Sheree Paolello reported.

He was turned down for parole 20 times. And if it weren't for the help of some dedicated University of Cincinnati law students and his determined wife, he might never have known life without bars.

"Free at last, free at last … Thank god almighty, free at last," said Reece.

"I had hope and I believed it would happen. But still I kept looking up at the ceiling to see if there were cracks. Was the ceiling about to cave in?"

Reece said he's not angry toward the woman and wouldn't talk about her. He said he's grateful to the law students who took on his case as part of a project to free wrongly incarcerated prisoners.

"I'm with my wife right now because of them," he said while he and Rita sat on the couch.

For Reece, it's not about how he was wronged, it's about making what's left of his life right.

"It's my wish to give back, to do the same thing for others that they have done for me," he said.

He said he plans to help other wrongly accused prisoners and to write a book .

"I want to pay if forward because I can't pay it back," he said.