The Nebraska Pardon's Board Wednesday denied a request for a hearing to consider commuting the sentence of an inmate who has served 43 years for a murder he didn't commit.

Evelyn Erving took her husband's case to the state capitol. "He's ready to come home, he's just been there so long." She doesn't want her husband's life sentence to turn into a death sentence. “He's 67 years old. He was 24 at that time. I'm asking for a hearing so we can get this thing started."

“Everyone needs a second chance and I have seen people get a second chance."

Jerry Erving entered prison in 1965 for his role in a 1964 robbery. He sat drinking at a bar when a friend pulled out a gun and shot the bartender during a robbery. Erving grabbed three whiskey bottles and left in the getaway car.

Larry Hall pulled the trigger. He told Channel 6 News that he planned the crime all by himself. “He was just there with me. I was the shooter, but he's still there."

Even though Hall pulled the trigger and was sentenced to life, he was paroled more than 20 years ago. “I don't feel good about that or what happened. I don't feel good about that either." The scene of the crime no longer exists, it's now an empty lot.

After Erving's conviction of first-degree murder, Evelyn asked for a divorce. “I was young, I was 18, there was no place to turn. I was devastated, I didn't know what to think. I was angry, I was hurt."

Time changed everything in the relationship between Evelyn and Jerry. They reconnected and remarried two years ago. “He's changed and I love him. He's back to being the person that I knew, he's back to being that person."

“If I plead guilty they would get cut loose for a lesser charge,” says Hall.

"From the heart does it seem right for him to still be there and other people are free," says Evelyn.

Erving had to persuade the governor, secretary of state and state attorney general who make up the pardon's board. The state used to commute life sentences for good behavior, but stopped in the early 90s.

“The shooter happened in a fortunate moment in history and that doesn't mean we're gonna square everything in history for the shooter,” says board member Jon Bruning. “He walked through a door that surprisingly opened."

Board members say even though Erving's case could draw sympathy, a hearing would bring false hope because a man convicted of a such a felony shouldn't go free.

“This person chose to be part in a cold-hearted murder that took someone's life who would otherwise be living the kind of life that you talk about and want for Mr. Erving," says board member John Gale.

So the board won't hear from prison supervisors about Erving's good record or see the trial transcript where the judge informed the jury that a life sentence could be commuted in the future.

“There's a broken system in Nebraska with the governor, attorney general and the secretary of state,” says Evelyn. “They are not even looking at the cases, they're not even considering to commute a sentence."

Evelyn says she's going to keep coming back to the board. Scott Polski, the attorney who took on the case for free, says he's going to try other legal options, including potential litigation against the board.

“This case was one to me that I just couldn't rationalize professionally or any other way,” says Polski. “How you could continue to hold this guy accountable?"

This was the third time Polski asked the state to commute Erving's sentence. “The simple fact is he didn't kill anyone, it was bad place, bad time to be somewhere."

Erving has actually been out of prison. When rules were less strict, he attended community college and would leave on furloughs. That's no longer possible.

His father was given a life sentence for shooting a man and was released from prison in the 1980s.