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In January 2000, Illinois Governor George Ryan declared a
moratorium on executions-the first such action by any governor in
the history of the United States. Despite a long history as a death
penalty proponent, Ryan was emotionally moved after allowing an
execution in 1999. He was also profoundly disturbed by the state's
history-12 men had been executed and 13 had been exonerated since
the return of the death penalty in Illinois in 1977. More had been
proven innocent than had been executed. Three years later, in 2003,
Ryan pardoned four death row inmates based on their actual
innocence and then commuted the death sentences of 167 men and
women. This was the largest death row commutation in U.S. history.
At that time, 12 states and the District of Columbia barred the
death penalty. His actions breathed new life into the movement to
abolish the death penalty in the United States. Over the next 15
years, Illinois and seven other states would abolish the death
penalty-New Jersey, Maryland, New Mexico, Connecticut, Delaware,
New York and Washington. Today, the push to reform the criminal
justice system has never been stronger in America, a nation that
incarcerates more men and women than any other country in the world
and also wrongfully convicts hundreds of men and women. Although
the number of executions carried out every year continues to drop
in the U.S., the death penalty still exists in 31 states. Moreover,
in some non-death penalty states, factions seek to reinstate it.
Until I Could Be Sure: How I Stopped the Death Penalty in Illinois
is, in his own words, the story of George Ryan's journey from death
penalty proponent to death penalty opponent. His story continues to
resonate today. He defied the political winds and endured the fury
and agony of the families of the victims and the condemned as well
as politicians, prosecutors and law enforcement. It is a story of
courage and faith. It is a timely reminder of the heroic acts of a
Republican Governor who was moved by conscience, his faith and a
disturbing factual record of death row exonerations.
The remote farming community of Murdock, Nebraska, seemed to be the
least likely setting for one of the heartland's most ruthless and
bloody double murders in decades. In fact, the little town had gone
more than a century without a single homicide. But on the night of
Easter 2006, Wayne and Sharmon Stock were brutally murdered in
their home. The murders garnered sensational frontpage headlines
and drew immediate statewide attention. Practically everybody
around Murdock was filled with fear, panic, and outrage. Who killed
Wayne and Sharmon Stock? What was the motive? The Stocks were the
essence of Nebraska's all-American farm family, self-made,
God-fearing, and of high moral character. Barely a week into this
double murder investigation, two arrests brought a sense of relief
to the victims' family and to local residents. The case appeared to
fall neatly into place when a tiny speck of murder victim Wayne
Stock's blood appeared in the alleged getaway car. Then, an obscure
clue left at the crime scene took the investigation down a totally
different path, stretching into Iowa, Louisiana, New York, Texas,
and Wisconsin. By the time this investigation was over, the charges
against the original suspects were dismissed and two new
individuals emerged from the shadows. Author John Ferak covered the
Stock murders from the very beginning, including all of the trial
proceedings. When the criminal prosecution finally ended in 2007,
he remained puzzled by one nagging question: Why was the blood of
victim Wayne Stock in a car that was ultimately proven to have no
connection to the murders? Over the next few years, the astonishing
"bloody lies" were revealed, culminating in a law enforcement
scandal that turned the case on its head and destroyed the career
of Nebraska's celebrated CSI director, David Kofoed.
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