It was an accident

[Lanya]

Why parole a monster like Green

Gov. Huckabee probably never read the confession of a demented killer named Glen Green before he made the monster eligible for parole.
 Green's confession is so depraved, its sadistic details so scary that no sane, responsible adult would consider him for parole.
 If the governor didn't read the confession, he is guilty of dereliction of duty.
But if he read the confession and still considers Green deserving of parole, he's certainly unfit to hold office. Who would free a madman who beat an 18-year-old woman with Chinese martial-arts sticks, raped her as she barely clung to life, ran over her with his car, then dumped her in the bayou, her hand reaching up, as if begging for mercy?

We're publishing the gruesome picture of Green's victim on the front page because we believe her hand is reaching up to demand justice.
In usual fashion, Huckabee's office didn't even contact the victim's family about the clemency.
 Although he's required to by the Constitution, the governor, as is his custom, won't say why he granted clemency to this crazed killer (over the unanimous objections of the Post-Prison Transfer Board).

 Huckabee apparently listened to Green's minister (and a friend of the governor), who thinks the murder was an accident and Green was forced to confess.
The Jacksonville police, who arrested Green in 1974 after a witness linked him to the crime, think the minister and Huckabee are both delusional, which is the mildest epitaph we can print.

This old police reporter knows a genuine confession when he sees one, and Green's depravity has the ring of truth.
Green, a 22-year-old sergeant, kidnapped Helen Lynette Spencer on Little Rock Air Force Base, where he beat and kicked her as he tried to rape her in a secluded area. She broke loose and ran toward the barracks' parking lot, where he caught up with her and beat her with a pair of nunchucks.
 He then stuffed her into the trunk of his car and left her there while he cleaned up. Several hours later, he drove down Graham Road, past Loop Road and stopped near a bridge in Lonoke County. Green told investigators he put her body in the front seat and raped her because her body was still warm.
 He dragged Spencer out of his vehicle and put her in front of the car and ran over her several times, going back and forth. He then collected himself long enough to dump her body in Twin Prairie Bayou.
This is what the Rev. Johnny Jackson, interim pastor at Bethel Baptist Church in Jacksonville, calls an accident, and apparently Huckabee believes him.
 "There is no doubt in my mind that he could kill again," warns Pulaski County Prosecutor Larry Jegley.
The crime started out in his jurisdiction and ended in Lonoke County, where Prosecutor Lona McCastlain has also spoken out against the clemency.
"Life means life," she said, referring to Green's sentence after he plead guilty to Spencer's kidnapping, rape and murder.
As he grants clemency to scores of violent criminals, Huckabee's motives are the subject of speculation: Why, people are asking, is he doing it? After studying the record for several weeks, all one can say is that his actions perhaps reflect a combination of arrogance and avarice and ignorance.

 While his fellow governors keep electing him to top positions in their little club, he has alienated Arkansans of both parties. They're shocked at not only the amazing number of clemencies but also at the way he ignores the suffering of the victims' families, who are always the last to know when their loved one's killer is up for parole.

Bilenda Harris-Ritter, an attorney who now lives in California, is one of those people who worry all the time that Huckabee might free the man who killed their relatives. Harris-Ritter's parents were murdered in north Arkansas, and she has had to deal with heartless state bureaucrats as she fights to keep the killer locked up.
 Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger recently named Harris-Ritter chairman of the Public Employees Board, which oversees collective-bargaining agreements among 7,000 employers and 2 million employees.
She is upset that our governor has not been more forthright about his clemencies.
"Huckabee is required by law to make certain notifications. When he does not, the pardon should be voidable," she told us.
 She continued, "The people of the good state of Arkansas (and I really mean that) need to think seriously about impeachment."
When told that many people consider Huckabee our worst governor in recent memory, Harris-Ritter replied, "No argument from me, and I am a Republican!"

Next: Harris-Ritter's crusade

http://www.arkansasleader.com/frontstories/st_07_21_04/huckabee5.html

[Michael Tee]

HUGE error in judgment.  Certainly raises questions about fitness to lead.  Taking advice from a pastor in affairs of state is just ludicrous.

BTW, the whole article is an excellent argument for capital punishment.  Why give these guys second chances, why house and feed them, and why live with the risk?

[Lanya]

I have to admit I was thinking the same thing.  And I'm not usually pro-death penalty.

[R.R.]

Huckabee said it was the decision by former Arkansas Govs. Bill Clinton and Jim Guy Tucker that made DuMond eligible for parole, and Huckabee declined to reduce DuMond's sentence further.

"I've never made a decision about the DuMond case other than the decision to write the letter" to DuMond, Huckabee said. "That was my decision, but I didn't parole him, because governors don't parole people in Arkansas."

[Lanya]

R.R., this is a different case, another case. Not the DuMond case. 
In any event, I've seen published facts that differ from what you just cited but I'm not interested in googling for them right now.  Maybe another day.

[R.R.]

Different case, same smear.

Why parole a monster like Green

Ask the Democrats on the parole board, appointed by Bill Clinton, who paroled him.

[Lanya]

Missouri murder controversy hounds Huckabee

MCCLATCHY NEWS
    December 6, 2007

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee said this week that he is "heartbroken" over the pain suffered by the families of two women murdered in Kansas City more than six years ago.

Authorities say both victims, Carol Shields and Sara Andrasek, were killed by Wayne DuMond, who was released from an Arkansas prison in 1999, a year before Shields' murder. Their mothers say Huckabee is responsible, at least in part, for DuMond's release.

"What a fool," said Lois Davidson, Shields' mother. "Thinking he could rule the country when he couldn't even do a good job as governor of Arkansas."

Janet Williams, Andrasek's mother, said, "Wayne DuMond should have never been on the streets in Missouri. ... When politics are involved, people get hurt, and Sara and Carol Shields paid the ultimate price with their lives."

"I'm deeply sorry for what they've been through," Huckabee said in a telephone interview with The Kansas City Star on Tuesday. "Nothing I can do or say can reduce their level of grief." But the Republican said he wanted the families -- and the public -- to fully understand his role in DuMond's controversial release from custody. "I should be held responsible for the things I did," Huckabee said. "The one thing I didn't do is let him go."

DuMond died in 2005 in a Missouri prison, where he was serving time for killing Shields. He was never charged with killing Andrasek, although prosecutors say they have "no doubt" he did.

Huckabee's connection to Wayne DuMond has been a part of Arkansas politics for more than a decade. Now, as Huckabee climbs in some presidential polls, the case is getting new scrutiny.

A jury sent DuMond to prison in 1985 for the rape of Ashley Stevens, 17, a distant relative of then-Gov. Bill Clinton. While awaiting that trial, DuMond was castrated -- some say by assailants, others say at his own hand. But his conviction and imprisonment became a rallying point for Clinton critics and some Arkansas Republicans, who said they believed DuMond was innocent and in prison because of the Clinton connection.

In 1996, then-Gov. Huckabee said he planned to commute DuMond's sentence to time served, in part because evidence in the case was "questionable." That announcement set off bitter complaints, including from Stevens. On Jan. 16, 1997, Huckabee officially reversed the decision and denied clemency, but he told DuMond in a letter "my desire is that you be released from prison."

That day, the Arkansas Post Prison Transfer Board agreed to release DuMond.

Huckabee says claims that he had tried to influence the parole board were ludicrous. He admitted he considered commuting DuMond's sentence to time served and doubted DuMond's guilt in the 1990s. Now, he says, "given what's happened," he believes DuMond was guilty of rape and regrets the release.

"They say you're supposed to forgive," Davidson said. "There are two men I don't think I'll ever forgive: Mr. Huckabee and Wayne DuMond."

Dan White prosecuted DuMond for Shields' murder. A jury convicted DuMond; he was sentenced to life in prison. Huckabee "was certainly an advocate for the release of Wayne DuMond," White said last week. "I don't think there's any question he shares some responsibility."

Davidson and Williams say Huckabee has never called them to apologize or to explain his part in the case, even though he told interviewers he "felt horrible" about DuMond's release.



http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/ny-ushuck1206,0,1056909.story

[Lanya]

 [......]
His Lieutenant Governor Jim Guy Tucker commuted the sentence to 39.5 years, giving DuMond some hope of parole in the future. Tucker recommended against parole.

Mike Huckabee took office as governor of Arkansas on July 15, 1996.  On August 29 the parole board voted 4 to 1 to deny parole to DuMond. On September 20 Huckabee announced his intention to commute DuMond's sentence and a mandatory waiting period for public comment began.  This resulted in a huge response from the public both for and against commuting the sentence.

On October 31 Huckabee met with the parole board, which went into executive session.  This was probably a violation of Arkansas' open meeting laws, which only allows closed sessions to discuss personnel matters.  There were no minutes of the meeting, but four board members all say Huckabee pleaded DuMond's case.  There are conflicting stories about who called the meeting and whether it was a discussion of clemency or parole.  In any case, DuMond applied for reconsideration of his case two weeks later and the board voted on January 20 to grant his request.  This was very convenient for Huckabee, as he no longer had to make the controversial decision to commute the sentence.  He wrote a letter to DuMond denying the commutation of the sentence, but saying "my desire is that you be released from prison but I now feel that parole is the best way for your integration into society."
[.]
http://www.madison.com/post/entries/261029

[R.R.]

Article one: "That day, the Arkansas Post Prison Transfer Board agreed to release DuMond."

Article two: "His Lieutenant Governor Jim Guy Tucker commuted the sentence to 39.5 years, giving DuMond some hope of parole in the future."

The parole board is all Democrat. They released the guy. They were all appointed by Clinton or Guy Tucker.

Tucker can say whatever he wanted, but the fact of the matter is, when he commuted his sentence this gave him the opportunity for parole. Tucker made him eligible, and the Democrats on the parole board paroled him.

Huckabee had nothing to do with it.