The award-winning documentary “Deadline,” which takes viewers directly into the emotional and legal storm surrounding former Illinois Governor George Ryan’s extraordinary decision to commute the death sentences of all those on death row, will air on NBC during a special 2-hour “Dateline” program at 8 p.m. on July 30th. The Big Mouth Productions documentary has gained widespread critical acclaim and it was featured at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival. During filming, the program’s producers had unprecented access to Governor Ryan, to death row exonerees from Illinois, the special clemency hearings held prior to Ryan’s decision to commute the sentences, and to those death row inmates whose lives he spared. Renowned film critic Roger Ebert notes, “‘Deadline’ is all the more effective because it is calm, factual and unsensational. There are times when we are confused by its chronology and by how its story threads fit together, but it makes an irrefutable argument: Our criminal justice system is so flawed, especially when it deals with the poor and the nonwhite, that we cannot be sure of the guilt of many of those we put to death. George Ryan, not running for re-election, faced that truth and commuted those sentences, and said he could live with his decision.” Read more about the documentary. See also, Innocence.