Gary Gauger News Today

Randall ‘Madman’ Miller wanted out under the First Step Act from life in prison. He took part in a couple’s killings near Richmond in 1993, slitting the man’s throat, and other violence during a ‘war’ with the Hells Angels.

In 1994, Gary Gauger was wrongfully placed on death row, but was proven innocent a few years later. After his sentence was overturned, Gauger was profiled in a 2000 play called “The Exonerated.”  Northwestern’s Pritzker School of Law and School of Communication hosted a dramatic reading of the play Thursday — a reading that has a connection to the University because Gauger was a death row client at NU’s Center on Wrongful Convictions. “I was one of the lucky people… my friends we...

Northwestern Now Pritzker Law and School of Communication present “The Exonerated” April 15 Alumni Harry Lennix and Katrina Lenk and School of Communication Dean E. Patrick Johnson are featured in the April 15 reading of The Exonerated. Stage and screen star Harry Lennix (C ’86), School of Communication Dean E. Patrick Johnson and Tony Award winner Katrina Lenk, a graduate of Bienen School of Music, will be featured in a dramatic reading of “The Exonerated” at 6:30 p.m...

The Land Conservancy of McHenry County hosts Native Plant Gardening Webinars this spring The Land Conservancy of McHenry County is offering low-cost and free webinars on gardening with native plants during March and April. Courtesy of TLC   Updated 3/6/2021 1:06 AM The Land Conservancy of McHenry County is hosting a variety webinars in March and April that cover native plant, gardening and nature topics. Each webinar is $5 or free. Advance registration is required. More informati...

Scott Reeder: Temper justice with a little mercy By Scott Reeder I once spent Valentine’s Day on Illinois’ death row. This week I couldn’t help thinking about the strangest Valentine’s experience I’ve ever had. I spent February 14, 2000, in the death row visitor’s room at the Pontiac Correctional Center. I was there to interview a mentally-ill death row inmate who had become lost in the system. His schizophrenia had incapacitated him to such a degree that he couldn’t assist with h...

I once spent Valentine’s Day on Illinois’ death row. This week I couldn’t help thinking about the strangest Valentine’s experience I’ve ever had. I spent Feb. 14, 2000, in the death row visitor’s room at the Pontiac Correctional Center. I was there to interview a mentally-ill death row inmate who had become lost in the system. His schizophrenia had incapacitated him to such a degree that he couldn’t assist with his appeals. When making arrangements for the interview, I hadn’t th...

Scott Reeder writes about spending Valentines Day 20 years ago on Illinois death row and why it good that the state has abolished the death penalty.