"I told you guys when I first got arrested I didn't do it. I'm telling you now that I'm going home, I didn't do it," he told the swarm of reporters who rushed him after he emerged from Lower Buckeye Jail in Phoenix on Tuesday evening.

"Right now I just want to go home and be with my kids."

Merritt, the lone suspect in the Valley's high-profile "Freeway Shooter" case, was beaming as he walked out of jail at 6 p.m., hours after a judge ordered his release.

Dressed in a black T-shirt and jeans, Merritt hugged and chatted briefly with his attorneys immediately after stepping outside. None of the supporters who regularly attend his hearings were waiting outside the doorstep, though one woman was seen earlier outside the jail, talking to his lawyers.

It was Merritt's defense attorney, Jason Lamm, who whisked him away after giving a few statements to the media.

The state's case against Merritt appeared to have been thrown into turmoil after Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Warren Granville's ruling in a Tuesday morning hearing. The judge acted to modify Merritt's release conditions after a defense motion that called into question the ballistics evidence that prosecutors say links Merritt to the crimes. Granville found that there was a "material fact" not presented earlier in the case.