Unable to remove full phone encryption

Hello,

I flashed Cyanogenmod 9 on my S3, and wanted to play around with the full phone encryption feature. I decided I don't like it, and want to go back to no encryption.

I did a factory reset through the rom, and the phone still prompted me for my password. (?) I even tried to wipe in clockwork recovery and still no dice. I did notice that /sdcard cannot be mounted in clockwork recovery, and that might be the issue?

I feel like a complete newb here, but I was hoping someone could explain how to remove the encryption, and explain why it is still present after a factory reset....