Nancy Rish seeks clemency in 1987 buried alive murder

CHICAGO (WLS) -- After nearly three decades in prison, Nancy Rish is asking for clemency in the 1987 kidnap and murder of a wealth Kankakee man who was buried alive. Rish says she was wrongly-convicted, and her relatives are appealing to the Illinois Prison Review Board for her release.

In 1987, Stephen Small, a wealthy partner in a media firm, was buried alive in a field near Kankakee. Now, the man who murdered him says his girlfriend at the time was wrongfully convicted in the case.

Nancy Rish has been in prison for more than half her life.

"Nancy is innocent. The jury found her guilty. She's lost all her appeals but she's innocent," attorney Margaret Byrne said.

In 1987, Rish and her boyfriend Danny Edwards were convicted of luring Small from his home, placing him in a wooden box with a breathing tube, and then burying him alive. Edwards wanted a kidnapper's ransom, but the breathing tube was inadequate and Small suffocated.

Edwards and Rish were both convicted, though Rish has always insisted she didn't know what Edwards was up to and that her lawyers mishandled her defense.

"They didn't object. I wanted to scream myself, 'Objection,'" Jenny Woodrige, Rish's mother, said.

Rish's mother, sister and son went before the Prisoner Review Board Tuesday with affidavits signed by Edwards acknowledging he committed the crime -- and Rish didn't know of his plan

"He's said it many times, but he's never testified to it. He's never signed an affidavit. But this is the first legal time he's said it, so it constitutes new evidence," Jim Riddings, author of "Small Justice," said.

The Attorney General's Office said the courts found Rish guilty, her appeals without factual merit, and she's entitled to no break from her life sentence.

"Stephen Small was buried alive because Danny Edwards and Nancy Rish wanted to coerce $1 million from his family," Assistant Attorney General Erin O'Connell said.

"There's no way in the world that my mother could've committed that crime," Ben Rish said.

Ben Rish was 8 years old when his mother was convicted. He and his family contend that that affidavits beg innocence for a woman who's been a model prisoner for 27 years.

"I think if you look at all those things together, mercy is appropriate," he said.

If the prisoner review Board recommends her clemency to Gov. Pat Quinn, and the governor agrees, Rish could be released from prison. However, it wouldn't erase her conviction but would remove her life sentence for time served.