Ronald Ryan

Infobox Criminal
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date_of_birth = birth date|1925|2|21|df=y
place_of_birth = Carlton, Victoria, Australia
date_of_death = death date and age|1967|2|3|1925|2|21|df=y
place_of_death = HM Prison Pentridge, Coburg, Victoria
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conviction =
penalty =
status = Executed by hanging
occupation =
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children = 3 daughters [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0485330/ "The Last Man Hanged"] (1992)]

Ronald Joseph Ryan (birth date|1925|2|21|df=y - 3 February 1967) was the last person to be legally executed in Australia. It was alleged Ryan shot prison officer George Hodson, during a prison escape from Pentridge Prison, Victoria in 1965. The hanging of Ryan sparked the biggest public protests ever seen in the history of Australia. To this day, the Ryan case provokes questions of whether Ryan was guilty beyond reasonable doubt.

Life

Ronald Ryan was born on 21 February 1925 at the Royal Womens' Hospital in Melbourne's inner suburb of Carlton, to John and Cecilia Ryan. At the time of Ryan's birth in 1925, his mother was separated but still legally married to George Harry Thompson. The couple had separated in 1915 when Thompson left to fight the Great War. The relationship never resumed. Ryan's parents formed a relationship in 1924 and married after Thompson's death in 1927 from a car accident. In 1936 Ryan was confirmed in the Catholic Church. He took as his confirmation name Joseph, and then became known as Ronald Joseph Ryan.

Born into dire poverty, Ryan was a primary school student when state authorities declared him a "neglected child" and subsequently he was sent to Rupertswood Boys Home in Sunbury. At age 14, Ronald absconded from Rupertswood, and went to live in Balranald, New South Wales, where he lived and worked to support his mother and three sisters after their father John Ryan (aka Big Jack) died after a long battle with miners' phthisis turberculosis.

At the age of 23 Ryan returned to Melbourne. Ryan was a forestry worker, sleeper-cutter, champion cyclist and small-time criminal but had no record of violence. His social standing improved when he married the daughter of the Mayor of the middle class Melbourne suburb of Hawthorn, with whom he had three daughters. He was sent to Bendigo Prison for the first time in 1960 for factory-breaking and stealing offences. His time in prison was productive and he exhibited a disciplined approach to study, completing his Matriculation Certificate (year 12).

Ryan was described by the people who knew him as a likable character with dignity and self-respect. He was of above-average intelligence. He was regarded by the authorities as a model prisoner. However, upon his release from prison and on parole in 1963, he turned to gambling and quickly returned to crime after convictions for multiple counts of shop-breaking and a weapons offence. In 1964 he was sentenced to 14 years for armed robbery and other offences.

Escape and recapture

After Ryan was informed that his wife was filing for divorce, Ryan decided to escape from prison and take his family to Brazil, where there was no extradition treaty with Australia. On 19 December 1965, in a highly organised and audacious plan, Ryan and fellow prisoner Peter John Walker (a convicted car thief) escaped from Pentridge Prison.

At around lunchtime as prison officers were taking turns attending a Christmas party in the officers' mess hall, Ryan and Walker scaled a five-metre prison wall with the aid of two wooden benches, a hook and blankets. Running along the top of the wall to a prison watch tower, they overpowered prison guard Helmut Lange, and took his M1 carbine rifle. Ryan ordered Lange to pull the lever, which would open the prison tower gate to freedom. Lange pulled the wrong lever. When Ryan realised Lange had tricked him, he threatened Lange by cocking the rifle (which Ryan could not operate) with the safety-catch on. This faulty operation (conceded by Lange and confirmed by ballistic experts) would have caused an undischarged bullet to be ejected, spilling onto the floor of the tower. This bullet was one of eight rounds kept in every M1 carbine rifles issued to prison officers. Lange then pulled the correct lever to open the tower gate, the two escapees ran down the steps and onto the usually hectic Sydney Road.

The prison alarm was raised and began to blow loudly, indicating a prison escape. Prison guard William Bennett, standing on number 2 tower aimed his rifle at Ryan who was running around the road trying to seize a getaway vehicle. Armed prison guards, including Robert Paterson, came running out onto the street, on prison walls and on top of prison guard towers. Meanwhile, confusion and noise was gaining strength around the busy intersection of Sydney Road and O'Hea Street with vehicles and trams banking up and people running around between cars. Walker was running towards Ryan shouting frantically and pointing to the tower where Bennett had his rifle aimed in their direction. Paterson admitted that he came out of the prison main gate, stood on a low wall, aimed his rifle at Ryan, but fired a shot in the air when a woman came into his sight.

In scenes of noise and confusion, a loud whip-like crack of a single shot was heard, and a prison officer George Hodson (closely running after Walker, not far from Ryan) fell to the ground. He had been struck by a single bullet, travelling from front to back in a downward trajectory. The bullet had exited through Hodson's back, about an inch lower than the point of entry in his shoulder.

Based on Hodson's injuries, Ryan's defence counsel argued at his subsequent trial for murder that the ballistics evidence indicated that the fatal bullet entered Hodson's (shoulder) body at such a downward trajectory angle that Ryan (5 feet 8 inches (1.73 m) tall) would have had to have been 8 feet 6 inches (2.55 m) tall to have fired the shot. But the prosecution argued that Hodson (6 feel 1 inch (1.85 m) tall) could have been running in a stooped position, thus accounting for the bullet's fatal downward trajectory angle of entry.

Fourteen eyewitnesses testified in court that they heard only one shot - no person heard two shots fired. Paterson testified he fired a shot. If Ryan had also fired a shot, it is likely that at least one person would have heard two shots. All fourteen persons testified to hearing only one shot. Some witnesses testified they saw Ryan's rifle recoil when he fired - but the rifle actually had no recoil. Some witnesses testified they saw smoke from Ryan's rifle - but the rifle was actually loaded with smokeless ammunition.http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/23_Haunted.gif]

Ryan and Walker successfully eluded their pursuers outside Pentridge and escaped using a car they commandeered outside the prison. The prison escape was dominating newspapers and the media. One newscast reported that '... Ronald Ryan, serving time for burglary, seized a prison officer and shot him dead.' On 24th December 1965 the Victorian Government announced a 5,000 pounds (AU$10,000) reward for information leading to the capture of Ryan and Walker. It was reported in "The Age" newspaper that the Chief Secretary and Attorney General Arthur Rylah, issued a warning to the escapees that the killing of Hodson during the prison escape was the worst Victoria had known and that the "Hanging Act" was still in force.

In 2005, author Tony Reeves published a biography of the notorious Sydney criminal Lennie McPherson, who was known as Sydney's "Mr Big" of organised crime. According to Reeves's account, Lennie McPherson betrayed Ryan and Walker to Sydney police after they came to him for help. [Tony Reeves, 2005; "Mr Big: The true story of Lennie McPherson and his life of crime" (Allen & Unwin, Sydney), pp.96-102] .

After hiding out in country Victoria, Ryan and Walker fled to Sydney, arriving on 2 January 1966. During the journey they narrowly escaped capture -- a police car pulled up while they were filling their car at a petrol station and the two officers approached and chatted with them, but although they were the most wanted men in Australia, the officers failed to recognise them.

After arriving in Sydney, Ryan and Walker met McPherson at his Gladesville home, where he told them he could arrange passports and tickets to Brazil at a cost of £5,000 each. The following day McPherson arranged a meeting with an unnamed NSW politician, and they informed him that they did not have enough money, and that they planned to commit robberies to raise the required amount.

What Ryan and Walker did not know was that McPherson was a longstanding police informant. As soon as they arrived in Sydney, McPherson tipped off his police contact, Detective Inspector Ray "Gunner" Kelly about their presence. Unhappy with the idea of two desperate criminals on the loose in "his" territory, he quickly decided to give them up and told Kelly of their planned movements over the next few days. McPherson then arranged for Ryan to meet a woman (presumably for sex) at Concord Repatriation Hospital on the evening of 6 January. Acting on McPherson's information, DI Kelly set a trap for them with a heavily-armed contingent of around 50 police officers and detectives.

When their car pulled up near the hospital, Ryan walked over to a nearby telephone box, but it had been deliberately put out of order, so he walked over to a neighbouring shop and asked to use the phone there. The owner had been instructed to tell Ryan that his phone was also out of order, and as Ryan walked out of the shop he was tackled by six detectives, dropping a loaded .32 revolver that he had been carrying. At the same moment Det. Sgt Fred Krahe thrust a shotgun through the car window and held it at Walker's head, and he was captured without a struggle.

After a massive police manhunt, daily front-page news articles claiming that Ryan had shot and killed Hodson, and widespread community fear, Ryan and Walker were re-captured in the Sydney suburb of Concord, after 19 days on the run.

Trial and sentencing

Ryan and Walker were extradited back to Melbourne where they were jointly tried for the murder of George Hodson. Walker was later also tried for the shooting murder of an associate during the period when he and Ryan were at large.

It is alleged that Ryan made three verball confessions to police whilst being extradited to Melbourne. According to police, Ryan admitted to them he had shot prison officer Hodson. However, these verbal allegations were not signed by Ryan and he denied making such verbal or written confessions to anyone. The only signed document by Ryan was that he would give no verbal testimony. [http://australianscreen.com.au/titles/case-of-ronald-ryan/clip2/]

In March 1966, the case of "The Queen v. Ryan and Walker" began in the Supreme Court of Victoria. Justivce John Starke instructed the jury of 12-men to look at the realities of things and ignore all that they had read and heard about the case in the media. At trial Ryan testified, "At no time did I fire a shot. My freedom was the only objective. The rifle was taken in the first instance so that it could not be used against me". After a trial in the Victorian Supreme Court lasting twelve sitting days and despite inconsistencies of evidence, no scientific forensics of Ryan's rifle to prove it had fired a shot, the mysterious disappearance of several key pieces of evidence, including the spent cartridge and the bullet that actually killed Hodson, and the unusual downward trajectory of Hodson's fatal wound, the jury found Ryan guilty of murder.

Ryan was convicted of the murder of Hodson and sentenced to death by Justice John Starke, the mandatory sentence at that time. Walker was found not guilty of murder, but guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to 12 years imprisonment. [http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/7_RyanGuilty.jpg] [http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/15_RyanMother.gif]

According to the 12 male jurors, they evidently thought that the death sentence would be commuted as had happened in the previous 35 death penalties cases since 1951. According to one jury member's later account of the discussions in the jury room, not one member of the jury thought that Ryan would be executed. The jury had originally decided on a not-guilty verdict, but two jury members who thought Ryan was guilty convinced the others to bring in a guilty verdict. They were so sure that the death sentence would be commuted to life imprisonment, that they did not even discuss the issue of making a recommendation for mercy along with their guilty verdict.

Later, some of the jurors came forth and stated they would never have convicted Ryan of murder had they known that he would in fact be executed. The Victorian Government at the time was facing another State election and the then Victoria Premier Henry Bolte, wanted to win votes by taking the tough on crime stance. Bolte was reported as having said, "A hanging is 10 percent of the vote."

When it became apparent that the Liberal premier Mr (later Sir Henry) Bolte intended to proceed with the execution, a secret eleventh-hour plea for mercy was made by four jury members who had found Ryan guilty of murder. They sent petitioning letters to the Victorian governor, stating that in reaching their verdict, they had believed that capital punishment had been abolished in Victoria and requesting that the governor exercise the Royal Prerogative of Mercy and commute Ryan's sentence of death.

Bolte denied all requests for mercy and was determined Ryan would hang. The approaching execution of Ryan prompted widespread protests in Victoria and elsewhere around the country. [http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/25_Vigil.jpg]

Newspapers in Melbourne, traditionally supporters of the Bolte government, deserted him on the issue and ran a campaign of spirited opposition on the grounds that the death penalty was barbaric. There is some evidence that, for premier Bolte, Ryan's execution was an opportunity for him to re-assert his political authority after he had been thwarted by legal manouevres to ensure the execution of Robert Peter Tait in 1962.

As Ryan's execution approached, his 75-year old mother made a final plea to Premier Bolte for mercy. Cecilia Ryan wrote: "I plead at this late hour you will reverse your decision to hang my son. If you cannot find it in your heart to grant this request then I pray you will grant me one last favour, that the body of my son be given into my custody after his death so that I can give him a Christian burial.I pray to God for the success of this last prayer". Premier Bolte promptly replied in a letter, saying that her son would not be spared the death penalty and that his body would not be returned to her for a Christian burial.

On the last night before his execution, Ryan wrote letters to his family and to those who had fought tirelessly on his behalf. Ryan maintained his innocence to the end.

A nationwide three-minute silence was observed at the exact time that Ryan was hanged.

Execution

All calls for clemency, petitions and protests were to no avail. Ryan was hanged in 'D' Division at Pentridge Prison at 8.00 AM on Friday 3 February 1967. Only minutes before Ryan was led from the condemned cell to the gallows, Ryan insisted he was not guilty of murdering Hodson. Ryan was not given any sedatives and walked calmly onto the gallows trapdoor.http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/16_RyanDeath.gif]

Around three thousand protesters had gathered outside the prison. Several media journalists were invited to witness the execution. Later that day, Ryan's body was buried in an unmarked grave within the "D" Division prison facility. The exact location of Ryan's grave has never been released by the authorities. [http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/14_Witness.gif]

Recently, Ryan's family members made a request to have his body exhumed and placed with his late wife at Portland Cemetery. Victorian Premier John Brumby, has given permission for archaeological work and exhumation. However, the daughter of murdered prison guard Hodson objects, claiming Ryan does not deserve to be buried in consecrated ground. When visiting Ryan's unmarked grave recently, she danced and jumped on it. cite news |coauthors = Kelly Ryan and Ellen Whinnett |title=Ryan victim's daughter protests exhumation| url = http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,22671366-662,00.html|publisher= http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun|location = Melbourne, Australia | date = 30 Oct 2007|accessdate = 19 July 2008]

While it was not successful in averting Ryan’s execution, the protest campaign to save Ryan from the gallows ensured that governments around Australia regarded it as too difficult politically to ever resort to the death penalty again. Within twenty years, capital punishment would be abolished federally and in all state and territory jurisdictions. In 1985, Australia officially abolished capital punishment.

Today, almost all federal and state politicians from all political parties are opposed to the reintroduction of capital punishment in Australia, for all crimes. Whether these politicians are representative of their voters is less clear. In recent years, Australian politicians (both government and opposition) have made various comments that have changed Australia's opposition to the death penalty. The implications of this shift in Australian policy have not yet been fully explored or debated. [http://www.nswccl.org.au/issues/death_penalty/aust_policy.php#fn5]

Innocent of murder?

Australian Criminologist Professor Gordon Hawkins, at Sydney University Law School, presents a chilling case for doubt about the validity of the damning unsigned confessions of Ryan in a television film documentary, "Beyond Reasonable Doubt' [http://australianscreen.com.au/titles/case-of-ronald-ryan/clip1/] . Although verbal confessions are not permissible in court, in the 1960s the public and therefore the jury, were much more trusting of the police.

Evidence pointing to the innocence of Ronald Ryan may have gone to the grave with a prison warden who committed suicide by shooting himself in the head whilst on duty at Pentridge Prison, two years after Ryan was hanged. It is alleged that a close friend of Lange (who wanted to remain anonymous) claimed Lange had been troubled since the escape. Lange confessed to finding the missing bullet casing in the prison guard tower, and told his friend he had made an official report to prison authorities at the time, attaching the missing bullet casing. But Lange had been ordered by "someone" to make a new statement, excluding any reference to the missing bullet casing. Fearing for his job, Lange made a new statement. Later, Lange testified in court that he did not see a bullet casing.

Newly revealed information suggests that Helmut Lange may have known that Ryan was innocent, and that Lange was told by prison authorities to change his statement of what happened during the prison escape, which led to the shooting death of George Hodson. [http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/12_RyanSecret.gif]

All prison authorized M1 carbine rifles were issued with eight rounds of bullets, including the rifle seized by Ryan from Lange. Seven of the eight rounds were accounted for. If the eighth fell on the floor of the prison watch tower when Ryan cocked the rifle with the safety catch on, thereby ejecting a live round, then the bullet that killed Hodson must have been fired by a person other than Ryan.

Nineteen years after Ryan's execution, a prison officer, Doug Pascoe, confessed that he fired a shot during Ryan's escape bid. Pascoe believes his shot may have accidentally killed his fellow prison officer, Hodson. Pascoe had not told anyone that he fired a shot during the escape because at that time, "I was a 23-year-old coward". In 1986, he tried to tell his story but his claims were discredited by the authorities.

According to Ryan's defence lawyer Dr Philip Opas QC, Ryan's rifle was never scientifically tested. There was no proof that Ryan's rifle had been fired. The fatal bullet was never found. The spent cartridge, also, was never found. It was never proven that the fatal bullet came from the weapon in Ryan's possession. [http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/10_OpasRyanStory.gif] [http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/11_RyanCase.gif] [http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/22_Casewontdie.jpg]

In a letter "Opas on Ryan" to The Victorian Bar Association and published in The Bar News in Spring 2002, Dr Opas responds to a recently made assertion by person/s that Ryan was guilty, having verbally confessed to firing the shot that killed Hodson. This alleged assertion has emerged 35 years after Ryan was hanged. Dr Opas vehemently disagrees with this assertion and refuses to believe that at any time did Ryan confess to anyone that he fired a shot. Ryan gave evidence and swore that he did not fire at Hodson. He denied firing a shot at all. He denied the so-called verbal confessions said to have been made by him.

Contesting the fatal shot, Dr Opas explains in detail the facts, which he claims cannot lie - which cannot be mistaken - that not only did Ryan not fire a shot, but he could not have fired a shot. Witnesses for the prosecution claimed to have seen Ryan's shoulder jerk back and smoke coming from the barrel of the gun, when in fact that type of rifle had no recoil and it contained smokeless cartridges. [http://www.vicbar.com.au/pdf/Bar%20News%20PDF%20files/Spring%202002/Correspondance.pdf] Dr Opas says the last words Ryan said to him were, “We’ve all got to go sometime, but I don’t want to go this way for something I didn’t do.”cite web |title=Opas on Ryan|url=http://www.vicbar.com.au/webdata/VicBarNewsFiles/122 Correspondance.pdf|accessdate=2008-07-17 |publisher=Victorian Bar Association http://www.vicbar.com.au]

On 1 March 2004, in an interview with the [http://www.acadp.com Australian Coalition Against Death Penalty (ACADP)] Dr Opas said, "I want to put the record straight. I want the truth told about Ronald Ryan - that an innocent man went to the gallows. I want the truth to be made available to everyone, for anyone young and old, who may want to do research into Ryan's case or research on the issue of capital punishment. I will go to my grave firmly of the opinion that Ronald Ryan did not commit murder. I refuse to believe that at any time he told anyone that he did."

Mr. Justice Starke the judge at Ryan's trial, and a committed abolitionist, was convinced of Ryan's guilt but did not agree Ryan should hang. Until his death in 1992, Starke remained troubled about Ryan's hanging and would often ask his colleagues if they thought he did the right thing.

Alleged confession

In a book by Mike Richards entitled "The Hanged Man", it is alleged that Ryan confessed guilt to Pentridge Prison Governor Ian Grindlay, the night before the hanging. According to the book, Ryan said to Grindlay, "I did shoot him (Hodson) but I didn't mean to kill him only to stop him." It should be noted that Grindlay died more than one decade before the book that contains this allegation was published. The author's account of the truth is unreliable. [http://academic.bowdoin.edu/WritingGuides/primaries.htm]

The historical "fact" (something that is absolutely indisputable) and supported by Ryan's defense lawyer Dr Philip Opas QC, is that there are no records, nor is there any evidence whatsoever, anywhere, that Grindlay (while still alive) said to anyone at anytime, that Ryan had confessed guilt. [http://australianscreen.com.au/titles/case-of-ronald-ryan/clip2/]

Last legal execution in Australia

"The Last Man Hanged" is a dramatised documentary released in 1992 based on research, with a mixture of re-creating interviews and archival material depicting the events leading up to the hanging of Ronald Joseph Ryan in Pentridge Prison. What evolves in the documentary is a powerful and emotional statement about capital punishment - a universal story about the social and political pressures that can lead a government to take the life of a human being and the story of a complex Ronald Ryan, who was as much a victim of politics as the victims of society he had violated - a man who believed ultimately he had to die. It was later confessed by prison officer Robert Patterson, that he shot a gun, and was too much of a coward to confess earlier.

Cited references

Further reading

Film and television

* [http://australianscreen.com.au/titles/last-man-hanged/ "The Last Man Hanged"] , historical documentary, ABC, Australia, 1993
* [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119504/ "The Last Of The Ryans"] , television movie, Crawford Productions, Australia, 23 April 1997
* [http://australianscreen.com.au/titles/case-of-ronald-ryan/ "Beyond Reasonable Doubt - The Case of Ronald Ryan"] , documentary series, 1977 Australian Film Commission

Publications

*Dickens, Barry, "Remember Ronald Ryan: A Dramatic Play", Currency Press, Sydney, 1994, ISBN 0868193925
*Dickens, Barry, "Guts and Pity - The Hanging that ended Capital Punishment in Australia", Currency Press, Sydney, 1996 ISBN 0868194247
*Richards, Mike, "The Hanged Man - The Life and Death of Ronald Ryan", Scribe Publications, Melbourne, 2002, ISBN 0-908011-94-6

External links

* [http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=69909 "New resting place for Ronald Ryan"] , "National Nine News", 29 October, 2007
*Ewart, Heather, [http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2002/s504839.htm "35th anniversary of Australia's last execution"] , "7.30 Report", Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 14 March, 2002
*Norden, Fr. Peter, [http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=2192 "Remembering a hanging"] , Jesuit Communications Australia, 10 September, 2007
*Opas, Philip, [http://www.vicbar.com.au/webdata/VicBarNewsFiles/122%20Correspondance.pdf "The Innocence of Ronald Ryan"] , "The Victorian Criminal Bar", 2002
* [http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A160185b.htm "Ryan, Ronald Joseph (1925 - 1967)"] , "Australian Dictionary of Biography", Volume 16, Melbourne University Press, 2002, p. 157.
*Ryan, Michael, [http://www.vicbar.com.au/vicbar_oral/images/opas/15_RyanMother.gif"Ryan Still able to joke: mother"] , "Home News", 27 January, 1967