Chicago ? Dan Young Jr. had a $150,000 check in his name awaiting the governor’s signature – the price the state put on the nearly 13 years he spent in prison for murder before DNA testing cleared him.

Young, though, will never cash that check.

He died Thursday, hours after being struck by a hit-and-run driver as he walked on the city’s South Side.

Young, 45, had been a free man for just more than a year.

Police said they have yet to make an arrest in the accident, which took place Wednesday night. The driver of the SUV drove off.

Young had been released from prison in January 2005 after DNA testing failed to link him and another man to the 1990 murder and sexual assault of Kathy Morgan, 39, whose body was found in a South Side building after a fire.

Young, who could not read or write and had a low IQ, said he falsely confessed to the crime after being mistreated by police, a claim detectives have denied.