Judge temporarily blocks parole hearings for 45 KY inmates serving life sentences

A state judge has temporarily halted the Kentucky Parole Board from giving new parole hearings to 45 Kentucky prisoners whom the board previously ordered to serve out their life sentences for charges including murder, rape, and kidnapping.

Laurel Circuit Judge Michael Caperton issued the temporary restraining order Thursday at the request of Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron and Jackie Steele, Commonwealth’s attorney for Laurel and Knox counties.

Cameron and Steele sued the state Parole Board June 11 to overturn a policy under which several convicted murderers would get new chances at parole despite earlier orders to spend the rest of their lives behind bars.

“We are grateful that the court acted with urgency to grant the temporary restraining order and stop the Parole Board from giving new hearings to 45 convicted criminals who are responsible for some of the worst crimes in recent history,” said Cameron.

“The Parole Board failed to provide the court with a valid reason for the new policy. We will continue to fight in court on behalf of Kentucky crime victims and prosecutors to ensure that the board’s directive is permanently stopped.”

Steele said, “When victims are finally told that those responsible for carrying out a crime against their loved one will serve out their sentence, they feel like they can close out a painful chapter and start the healing process. For a government agency to open it all back up, like the Parole Board did, is terrible. We have to stop it, and we have to be there for crime victims to ensure that this directive can never be implemented.”

“The parole eligibility hearings in question will not go forward,” said a statement from the parole board.

Commonwealth’s Attorney David L. Dalton has filed a similar complaint in Pulaski Circuit Court.

At issue in the lawsuits is a change the Kentucky Parole Board made in April. Under its old rule, the board could issue a “serve out” order at the first parole hearing of people serving sentences of life or life without parole for a minimum of 25 years.

A serve out order meant the inmate would spend the rest of his or her life in prison.

Under the change, the board could no longer issue a serve out order at an offender’s first parole hearing. That could apply in many cases going forward.

But the board also applied the change retroactively, giving another chance at parole to 45 inmates who had been ordered to stay in prison until they died.

Prosecutors and family members of crime victims did not like the change. The family members of crime victims said the change reopened a painful event in their lives and they would have to fight again against parole for an offender.

The lawsuit by Cameron and Steele argues that the Parole Board did not follow the procedure required to put forth a new regulation, which includes allowing public comment and having and review by a legislative committee.

The new rule also purports to grant rights to prisoners that they’re not entitled to under existing law, the complaint argues.

The inmates previously given serve outs but eligible for another parole hearing under the rule include Donald Terry Bartley, who took part in the murder of Tammy Dee Acker, a University of Kentucky student stabbed to death in Letcher County in 1985; Stephanie Spitser, who strangled her 10-year-old stepson, Scotty Baker, to death in Clay County in 1992; Leif Halvorsen, who was sentenced to death for taking part in a triple homicide in Lexington in 1983; Clawvern Jacobs, who was convicted of kidnapping Judy Ann Howard, a student at Alice Lloyd College in Knott County, sexually abusing her and beating her to death with rocks in 1986; and Jeffrey B. Coffey, convicted of murdering two teenagers on a date in rural Pulaski County in 1985.

The new rule doesn’t mean any of the inmates will get out of prison. The Parole Board could deny them release again.