Huckabee's Willie Horton

ABC's The Blotter reports on a nasty skeleton in Mike Huckabee's closet:

A Missouri mother says she will do "whatever it takes" to stop former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee from becoming president, because he freed the man who went on to rape and murder her daughter, Carol Sue Shields (pictured).

"I can't imagine anybody wanting somebody like that running the country," Lois Davidson of Adrian, Mo., told the Blotter on ABCNews.com.

Huckabee isn't being tarred with this brush merely because he happened to be governor of Arkansas at the time:

Wayne Dumond was initially sentenced to life plus 25 years for raping a 17-year-old Arkansas high school cheerleader. In 1999, a parole board voted to free Dumond, after then-Gov. Mike Huckabee announced his desire to see him released.

A former parole board member tells ABC News that Huckabee exerted strong pressure on the board to release Dumond.

Since Huckabee seems to be enjoying favor with the mainstream press, it remains to be seen what sort of legs this story will have.

Thanks to Bithead of BitsBlog.