Cult member dies on Nebraska's death row 30 years after being convicted of horrific murders

A man who had spent three decades on Nebraska's death row for the monstrous 1985 cult killings of two people, including a five-year-old boy, has died in prison, officials said.

Michael Ryan died around 5.45pm on Sunday at the Tecumseh State Correctional Institutional in southeast Nebraska, the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services said in a news release. Tecumseh prison spokeswoman Jessica Houseman did not have a cause of death but said an autopsy would be performed.

At a hearing in March about legislation to repeal the state's death penalty, state Senator Ernie Chambers said Ryan had terminal brain cancer. Houseman would say only that Ryan was being treated for a long-term medical condition.

Ryan was convicted in the torture and killing of 26-year-old James Thimm at a southeast Nebraska farm near Rulo, where Ryan led a cult, and in the beating death of Luke Stice, the five-year-old son of a cult member. Ryan had been on death row since September 12, 1985.

Over three days, Thimm was beaten, sexually abused, shot, stomped and partially skinned while still alive. His fingertips had been shot off on one hand.

The Ryans and about 20 cult members lived on the farm. The group hated Jews and stored weapons in preparation for "a final battle between good and evil", authorities have said. Ryan told his followers that he heard the voice of God and that Thimm had angered God.