GOP presidential candidate Huckabee pushed for release of rapist and murderer during his term as Governor Nick Langewis

Published: Saturday December 8, 2007



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Print This Email This Ascending in the Iowa caucus polls, Former Arkansas Governor and GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee has come under intense scrutiny over his involvement in the early prison release of recidivist rapist and murderer Wayne DuMond in 1999. "There were no letters sent to the governor's office from any rape victims," said Huckabee spokesperson Alice Stewart to the Huffington Post. In addition, Huckabee told CNN on Sunday, December 2: "None of us could've predicted what [DuMond] could've done when he got out." Documents and personal accounts obtained by the Huffington Post directly contradict the above two statements. As the Huffington Post details in its Tuesday exposé, Huckabee had been repeatedly warned, including from DuMond's victims themselves, that DuMond was likely to be a continued threat to society if he were to be released from prison. DuMond had been sentenced to life in prison plus twenty years, which was reduced to 39.5 years under Governor Jim Guy Tucker, for the 1984 rape of 17-year-old Ashley Stevens, a distant cousin of then-governor Bill Clinton. Clinton's ties to the victim, which prompted him to recuse himself from the case, was ultimately used to help fuel an aggressive campaign to release DuMond. On his release in September of 1999, DuMond moved to Missouri and proceeded to rape and murder 39-year-old Carol Sue Shields, a crime for which he would eventually perish in prison, but not before allegedly claiming one more victim, 23-year-old Sara Andrasek, in the same fashion in June of 2001. While Huckabee denies ever receiving letters from DuMond's victims, staffers say that the letters did exist, but were considered politically damaging and hidden away accordingly. Huckabee and the Arkansas Parole Board have refused to release any letters they may or may not have received. However, Parole Board members have gone on record. One New York Times report has a member insisting that Huckabee actively lobbied the Board to release DuMond. "He expressed his concerns about DuMond's guilt," says former member Deborah Suttlar. "He felt he deserved to be released." As did Baptist pastor Rev Jay D. Cole, a personal friend of Huckabee's, who enlisted his help in lobbying for DuMond's release after DuMond was said to have "found God," after also forcibly losing his testicles, supposedly to a band of attackers; the story was taken by some as a self-inflicted ploy for sympathy. Suttlar abstained from the vote that released DuMond, after years of rejections, out of disgust. In addition, Huffington Post editor Nico Pitney appeared with two Arkansas Parole Board members, Ermer Pondexter and Dr. Charles Chastain, on MSNBC's Abrams Report to discuss repeated claims by Huckabee that the Board, rather than himself, were responsible for DuMond's 1999 release. "There's no question that the Governor brought up the issue of releasing Wayne DuMond," counters Chastain, the only Board member to vote against DuMond's 1999 release. "I don't know who initiated the meeting, but we were told that the Governor [wanted] to come and meet with various boards and commissions." Chastain says that Huckabee specifically brought up the DuMond case in an executive session, portraying DuMond as a "guy from the wrong side of the tracks who got a raw deal." "I responded," says Chastain, "by saying: 'Governor, If you rape a cheerleader in a small town like that, you're going to get a long sentence if you're convicted. And, furthermore, that sentence had been changed by former governor Tucker to 39 1/2 years." "When I was called for the next board meeting," adds Pondexter, "I was informed by board members that the Governor had appeared before them, asking them for support in the release of parole in DuMond." Huckabee told NBC's Meet the Press on November 28 that the Parole Board asked his personal advice on whether DuMond should be paroled, and he, in turn, said that it ought to be given a "serious look." Dr. Chastain disagrees: "If you think about it, there's no reason why the Parole Board would be asking the governor for advice about a given individual." He continues: "[Huckabee has] met with a lot of people like me many, many times all day. I met with the Governor one time while on the Parole Board in seven years." Concludes Chastain, "I remember it very clearly." Video of the entire MSNBC Abrams Report exchange, broadcast on December 6, 2007, is available for viewing below.



