Woman Who Fell In Love With Death Row Inmate Planned To Break Him Out By Renting A Helicopter

Many claim they would do anything for love.  I'm going to bet that almost all of them wouldn't be willing to rent a helicopter in order to bust the person they love out of prison.

That's what separates a now 31-year-old woman by the name of Ivana, and the standards she set for love, from everyone else.  She was ready and willing to do that for her death row inmate boyfriend.

Ivana was 24 when she fell for convicted killer Benjamin Ritchie.  He was being held in an Indiana state prison for the 2000 killing of a police officer.

Ivana (not pictured) and her death row inmate boyfriend (not pictured) came up with a plan to use a helicopter to break him out of prison. (Image Credit: Getty)

Ritchie was behind the wheel of a stolen van when police gave chase.  He wrecked it, opened fire after the crash, and one of the five shots ended up killing an officer.

While on death row, Ritchie appeared in a YouTube documentary.  Ivana, living in Sweden at the time, saw the documentary and decided to write to him.  This was the beginning of a four-year long relationship.

Not long after they started writing to each other, Ivana was flying out from Sweden to meet him.  They met more than 10 times and fell in love.

"Every time I went to see him, we had a week scheduled, so we could have visits for the whole week," she told Soft White Underbelly.  "Because I was an overseas visitor, I was allowed to spend the entire day until 4pm with him."

Ivana was in love the moment she looked into his eyes.  She said of Ritchie, "I couldn’t imagine a life without him.  It was either be with him or die with him."

Love On Death Row Isn't An Easy Thing To Navigate

It turns out she had a soft spot for those in the prison system.  When she was younger, her dad spent some time behind bars.

Over the course of Ivana and Ritchie's relationship, the two hatched a plan to break him out of prison.  She was going to rent and hijack a helicopter in order to help him escape.

Ivana knew that this didn't mean a long life together, but she hoped to spend a week free with the man she loved before being caught and maybe killed by the police.  But before she could move forward, Ritchie had called the plan off and their relationship came to an end.

"In the end, he told me he didn’t want to risk my life, so he could get out," she said.  "That’s when I went crazy because my whole plan for my life was to be with him."

This sent Ivana down a dark path.  She started doing opiates and fell in with the wrong crowd, including a drug dealer who she developed a relationship with.  When he got clean, she tried to keep up her drug habit on her own.

It didn't work.  She was spiraling out of control until one day she ended up getting pregnant.  That changed her life, and she's now clean and sober.

Despite taking positive steps in her life, she can't look back at her former flame, Benjamin Ritchie, without those old feelings peaking their heads out.  She was in love and ready to die with him.

She had followed her heart and not her brain.  As a result, she was hurt when the plan to spring him broke down and still isn't able to reach out to him.

"That’s why I can’t look him up – I promised I would be there [for his execution]," she said.

That's heartbreaking stuff right there.  It's good to hear she's gotten her life back on track.  It just goes to show you can never be too careful with matters of the heart.