Andrew Malkinson, 57, was found guilty of raping a woman in Greater Manchester in 2003 and the next year was jailed for life with a minimum term of seven years.

He remained in jail for another decade because he maintained his innocence.

Mr Malkinson had his conviction quashed last month at the Court Of Appeal after fresh DNA evidence emerged linking another potential suspect to the crime.

Following Monday's ruling, he said: "I feel vindicated by the court's finding that Greater Manchester Police unlawfully withheld evidence, denying me a fair trial and causing my wrongful conviction nightmare.

"The evidence needed to overturn my conviction has been sitting in police files for the past two decades.

"Yet the CCRC [Criminal Cases Review Commission] did not bother to look and it fell to the small charity Appeal to bring it to light."

He also asked for the CCRC's chair Helen Pitcher to apologise "and take accountability for the CCRC's failures, which cost me extra years behind bars for a crime I did not commit".

At the time of Mr Malkinson's trial, there was no DNA evidence linking him to the crime and the prosecution case against him was based only on identification evidence.

Mr Malkinson's convictions - two counts of rape and one of choking or strangling with intent to commit rape - were overturned by Lord Justice Holroyde.

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In Monday's ruling, the three judges said Mr Malkinson's conviction was also unsafe because of failures to disclose evidence.

They include police photographs of the victim's left hand, which supported her evidence that she broke a nail scratching the face of her attacker, and the fact the two witnesses who identified Mr Malkinson had convictions for dishonesty offences.

Edward Henry KC, for Mr Malkinson, previously described these as "deplorable disclosure failures, which mostly lay at the door of the Greater Manchester Police".

None of this was available to Mr Malkinson's defence team at his trial and Mr Henry said the failure to disclose the photographs "deprived" Mr Malkinson of his "strongest defence point - his lack of any facial injury".

On Monday, Lord Justice Holroyde said: "The stark reality is that the appellant has spent very many years in prison, having been convicted on identification evidence which he always disputed and which cannot now be regarded as providing a safe basis for the jury's verdicts.

"We regret that this court cannot alter that fact."