Former Illinois governor George Ryan dies at the age of 91 – NBC Chicago

The competitive former Illinois Governor George Ryan died at the age of 91.

Ryan, who worked as a governor of Illinois from 1999 to 2003, died on Friday morning after he had spent the last few days in hospice care, according to the former Republican of Illinois House Republican Jim Durkin, a close friend of Ryan.

No cause of death was immediately given.

Ryan was in the state government for 40 years and spent almost six years in prison in Terre Haute, Indiana.

Ryan was convicted in a case that was suggested by the 1994 motorway accident, in which six children were killed by Scott and Janet Willis. The truck driver who caused the accident had received a driver’s license from an employee in Ryan’s office by a bribery allowance when he was State Secretary.

He was sentenced in 2006 for the federal corruption suspicion after being accused of the FBI for scrap, conspiracy, tax fraud and false statements. Ryan was also instructed to pay a refund of USD 603,348.

In 2014, Ryan the Chicago Sun-Times announced that he prays for Willis Children every day, but no responsibility for her death.

As governor, Ryan increased the death penalty in Illinois and condemned hundreds of inmates in the death cell.

He says the beginning of his prison sentence was rocky because “some of the guards were angry” because of his decision on the death penalty.

“They made things a little rough, but they take care of it,” he remembered, remembering that he got to know “some real bangs”, but also “some real decent people” during his stay.

During his time behind bars, his 55 -year -old wife Lura Lynn Ryan died after a long fight with cancer.

In July 2013, at the age of 79, Ryan was released from federal custody and finally returned to his house in Kankakee.

“I feel wonderful. I’m happy to be at home,” said Ryan at the time. “There is no place like at home, especially in America and freedom is a great thing. I am glad that I have mine back.”

During a lecture from 2015, Ryan said that he served time for allegations of corruption, a new perspective on the punitive justice system.

“Justice should be blind, but the fact is that most people are blindly over the judiciary,” said Ryan. “Those of us who were there and come out of prison and wonder what’s going on. There are people who are worried about what will happen to us, but I am not sure whether they take care of it so much.”

While he spoke in the coalition to reduce lunch from Recidivism this year, Ryan said that he wanted to remove the stigma that is connected to those who have served their debts to society. He gave a speech that focused on his successful efforts to eliminate the death penalty in Illinois.

“You did the smartest thing you could do, you abolished it,” said Ryan. “It was so broken. It had to be repaired, repaired, and we couldn’t do that. So if you cannot repair a system that will take a life to someone, make it the best system you can do, then you should probably not have such a law. And that’s exactly what Illinois decided.”