Illinois top lawyer suing to stop hearings

CHICAGO -- The state attorney general sued to stop hearings for nearly 160 death row inmates seeking clemency, calling planned time limits on the procedures unfair and unconstitutional.\nA second lawsuit Tuesday by Republican Jim Ryan, who is running for governor, challenges the authority of outgoing Republican Gov. George Ryan to commute death sentences in 32 of the cases.\nThe governor, who isn't related to the attorney general, halted executions in January 2000 after a string of death row inmates was released on new evidence, and he has said he is seriously considering commuting all death sentences to life in prison.\nThe Illinois Prisoner Review Board's plan for clemency hearings next month give each side 15 minutes to present a case.\nThe first lawsuit, filed in Sangamon County Circuit Court, said the format "denies crime victims, witnesses and their families fundamental fairness and dignity" guaranteed by the Illinois Constitution.\n"While we are trying to improve the accuracy and fairness of the system, we also have another job to do, and that is to respect the dignity and the rights of crime victims," the attorney general said at a news conference as a dozen victims' family members stood behind him.\nKaty Salhani, whose sister Debra Evans of Addison and two of her children were killed and a nearly full-term baby cut from Evans' womb, said she wants time to argue for convicted murderer Fedell Caffey to be put to death.\n"My sister wasn't given minutes, a time limit to choose," Salhani said.\nThe second suit, filed in Illinois Supreme Court, argues that the governor cannot commute the sentences of 23 prisoners who did not sign clemency petitions and another nine whose death sentences were overturned and who are awaiting resentencing.\nLawrence Marshall, legal director of the Center for Wrongful Convictions at Northwestern University, called the lawsuits a "pretty blatant political ploy."\nThe attorney general is running against Democratic Rep. Rod Blagojevich in the Nov. 5 election. George Ryan announced last summer he would not seek a second term.\nDennis Culloton, a spokesman for the governor, said the lawsuit over the 15-minute limit appears moot because the review board has indicated the limit is a guideline, not a rule.\n"I would hazard a guess that this would be more about getting some free press" than about Jim Ryan's concerns, Culloton said.