Kansas City, Mo. ? A prisoner’s respectful letter to a federal judge finally led to his release more than two years after the judge had ordered him set free because his conviction had been overturned.

Reynaldo Tovar-Valdivia, now 42, was arrested by Kansas City police in April 1998 and charged with possessing methamphetamines with intent to distribute. A little over a year later, he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Tovar-Valdivia asked to serve his sentence in California, and was sent to Taft Correctional Institution in Taft, Calif.

He appealed his conviction on grounds that he’d been searched illegally, and won.

Consequently, U.S. District Judge Howard Sachs of Kansas City signed an order for Tovar-Valdivia’s release in January 2000.

But somehow, the release never happened, and Tovar-Valdivia remained behind bars. A spokesman at the prison did not immediately return a phone call Monday.

He wrote a letter in March of this year to Judge Sachs, including pages from the October 1999 ruling by the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which told the judge to order the prisoner’s release.

“I would like to humbly request that this court makes an order invalidating my conviction,” the prisoner wrote.

It was not clear why the prisoner waited so long before writing his mild complaint. But in the letter, he said he had not been able to reach his lawyer in two years.

His attorney, Larry Pace, said he never heard back from his client.

“I assumed he had been released,” Pace said. “He wasn’t released. It’s nuts.”