Candidate Mike Huckabee to blame for killer's release?
Posted on Tue, Dec. 04, 2007 10:15 PMr Murdered women's mothers blame Huckabee for his part in killer's release By DAVE HELLING The Kansas City Star Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee said Tuesday he is “heartbroken” over the pain suffered by the families of two women murdered in the Kansas City area more than six years ago. Authorities say the two victims, Carol Shields and Sara Andrasek, were killed by the same man: 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 the release of DuMond, who died in a Missouri prison in 2005. “What a fool,” Lois Davidson, Shields’ mother, said of Huckabee. “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 phone interview with The Kansas City Star. “Nothing I can do or say can reduce their level of grief.” But the Republican said he hoped the families — and the public — would fully understand his role in DuMond’s 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, apparently of natural causes, at age 55 in the Crossroads Correctional Center in Cameron, Mo., where he was serving time for killing Shields. He was never charged with killing Andrasek, although prosecutors say they have “no doubt” he committed the crime. Huckabee’s connection with DuMond has been a part of Arkansas politics for more than a decade. Now, as Huckabee climbs in some presidential polls, the DuMond case is getting new scrutiny across the nation. A jury sent DuMond to prison in 1985 for the rape of 17-year-old Ashley Stevens, a distant relative of then-Gov. Bill Clinton. While awaiting trial on the rape charge, DuMond was castrated. Some say assailants did the castration, others say he did it. But his conviction and imprisonment became a rallying point for Clinton critics and some Republicans in Arkansas, who said they believed DuMond was in prison because of the Clinton connection, and that he was innocent of the charges. In 1996, then-Gov. Mike Huckabee joined the discussion, saying he planned to commute DuMond’s sentence to time served, in part because evidence in the case was “questionable.” But Huckabee’s 1996 commutation announcement set off bitter complaints from some in Arkansas, including Stevens. On Jan.16, 1997, Huckabee officially reversed the decision and denied clemency, although 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. The role Huckabee played in the parole decision is still in dispute. Some parole board members have since said they made the decision without pressure from Huckabee; others, though, said he had talked with them about his desire for DuMond to be released. “He made it obvious that he thought DuMond had gotten a raw deal and wanted us to take another look at it,” former board member Charles Chastain said in 2001. “Some board members who were usually very tough about letting people out ... (later) voted in favor of him, and seemed eager to.” The Star’s DeAnn Smith contributed to this report. To reach Dave Helling, call 816-234-4656 or send e-mail to dhelling@kcstar.com. http://www.kansascity.com/news/politics/story/389698.html