Chicago Indymedia : http://chicago.indymedia.org/archive
Chicago Indymedia

News :: [none]

Governor pardons Rolando Cruz, two others wrongly convicted

By Jan Dennis
Associated Press Writer
Published December 19, 2002, 1:05 PM CST

URBANA -- Gov. George Ryan today pardoned three men wrongfully convicted of murder, including Rolando Cruz, whose case has served as a symbol of flaws in the death penalty system.
Ryan made the announcement as he spoke before the University of Illinois College of Law on the state’s flawed death penalty system. Ryan has been considering commuting the death sentences of about 140 men who are on death row now. The men he pardoned today had already been released.

``I wish them well; they’ve been through hell,’’ Ryan said as the crowd gave him a lengthy ovation.

The pardons, which had been widely expected, came a day after federal prosecutors released papers alleging that Ryan had personal knowledge of wrongdoing by aides in the secretary of state’s office he ran before being elected governor in 1998.

The governor issued a statement Wednesday saying he had a ``clear conscience’’ but made no statement to reporters this morning.

Ryan has the power to grant clemency to all of the 160 inmates facing execution in Illinois, but he has said recently that granting clemency to all is not likely.

A Republican who did not seek re-election, Ryan leaves office Jan. 13.

His latest actions follow months of emotional pleas from lawyers and others who are convinced that Illinois’ death penalty system is fatally flawed, and counter-pleas from the families of victims of some of the most terrible crimes in the state’s history.

Ryan gained national prominence when he halted executions nearly three years ago, calling the state’s death penalty system ``fraught with error’’ after the courts found that 13 men on death row had been wrongly convicted since the state resumed capital punishment in 1977.

He pushed for a sweeping overhaul of the way capital cases are handled. Ryan later raised the possibility that he would commute the sentences of everyone facing execution. That led most of the death row inmates to file formal petitions for clemency.

Cruz was sentenced to die for the murder and rape of a little girl but later exonerated. His case has haunted police, prosecutors, politicians and the victim’s family for nearly 20 years. At a third trial, he was acquitted after a police officer changed his story about an incriminating statement Cruz supposedly made. DNA evidence later pointed to someone else as the rapist.

Also pardoned was Gary Gauger, who said he wants to clear his name and seek compensation after being wrongly convicted of killing his parents. Prosecutors opposed his pardon, though they did not dispute that 74-year-old Morris Gauger and 70-year-old Ruth Gauger were killed by members of the Outlaws motorcycle gang.

The third pardon went to Steven Linscott, who was convicted of murdering a young woman in suburban Chicago. Then a college Bible student managing a Christian halfway house with his wife, he told police about a strange dream he had, which in some ways was similar to the attack.

The police considered it a confession. He ended up going to prison for more than three years before his conviction was overturned by an appellate court and subsequent DNA testing exonerated him.

Copyright © 2002, Chicago Tribune
 
 
 

Donate

Views

Account Login

Media Centers

 

This site made manifest by dadaIMC software