Two decades ago, a Miami jury convicted Italian filmmaker Enrico Forti of murdering an Australian man whose bullet-ridden body was discovered in the sands of Virginia Key. Forti’s claim of innocence has become a cause célèbre in Italy, even as he serves a life prison sentence in Florida and state courts have consistently rejected his appeals on the conviction for the 1998 murder of Anthony “Dale” Pike.

But Forti, 61, may soon be back in his native country after Gov. Ron DeSantis, at the request of the U.S. Department of Justice and the Italian government, “conditionally approved” his transfer of custody to Italy — a move fiercely opposed by the Miami-Dade prosecutors who convicted him.