Remembering Ryan

"Barring last minute clemency by the Singaporean Government, this Friday 25-year-old Australian Van Nguyen will be executed in Singapore's Changi prison.

"Singapore maintains that hanging is a quick, clean, humane form of killing -- a benign method of execution.

"Others beg to differ -- among them two men who were intimately involved in the case of Ronald Ryan, the last man to hang in Australia."
Radio National Breakfast

Ronald Ryan

At 8:00am on February 3, 1967, the last human being in Australia to be killed by the State fell through the trapdoor and died on the same gallows as Ned Kelly. Ronald Ryan is buried in quicklime within the grounds of Pentridge Prison. His family are forbidden to visit the unmarked grave. On November 28, 2005 on ABC Radio National, elderly Judge Opas, who was Ronald Ryan's lawyer to the end, stated that he still firmly believes that Ryan was innocent.

Listen (requires RealAudio) -- extraordinary interview with two elderly men. One was a journalist who witnessed the last execution in Australia. The other is Judge Opas.

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I could not tell a lie
By Pip Wilson
(Based on an anecdote; avowedly a true story)

The judge sat through the weeks of trial
and sentenced Ryan to hang.
Premier Bolte sent for him
and asked him if this man,
this Ronald Ryan was truly guilty,
or was there “some way out,
with the election coming up and all” --
said the judge “No reasonable doubt”.

So Ronald Ryan’s neck was stretched;
the judge spoke to the press:
“I could not tell a lie”, he said
“I’m of the faith” he stressed.

And further pressed on how he felt,
said the judge “Ryan had the right
to absolution, he’s now in heaven.
I pray to him each night.”

Tagged: singapore, australia, execution, van+nguyen, capital+punishment, human+rights