Apparently now’s the time to talk about Huckabee’s “Willie Horton”

Way back in March in this post, I highlighted the sentencing story within this fascinating Salon piece discussing the prospects of Republican candidate Mike Huckabee.  That story discussed Huckabee’s “willie Horton” problem in the form of Wayne Dumond, a rapist paroled in Arkansas when Huckabee was governor who murdered a woman after being released.   Perhaps because Huckabee continues to rise in the polls, this story is now garnering new nation attention.  Byron York explains in this new item from the National Review Online:

In August, I interviewed former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee about the case of Wayne Dumond, the convicted rapist who was freed under Huckabee’s administration, only to rape and kill a woman in neighboring Missouri. The crime attracted enormous attention in Arkansas, but at the time of our interview, it had not made its way into much coverage of Huckabee’s presidential bid. “If [Huckabee] continues to rise in the polls,” I wrote, “it’s likely he’ll be talking about it a lot more.”

Now Huckabee is rising in the polls, and sure enough, the Dumond case is attracting more attention. This morning, ABC News ran a report featuring the mother of the woman Dumond murdered, who blames Huckabee for her daughter’s death and vows to do everything she can to stop his campaign. “I can’t imagine anybody wanting somebody like that running the country,” the woman told ABC.

The story seems to be developing from many angles, and here’s additional coverage from Murray Waas at The Huffington Post.  This item at Monsters and Critics.com simply asks “Is Wayne Dumond Huckabee’s Willie Horton?”