Off-duty D.C. police officer Oliver Wendell Smith Jr. was fatally shot in Prince George's County 14 years ago.
The killers were caught and sentenced to long prison sentences. But Smith's family and other survivors of violence in Maryland say they are being repeatedly victimized by an obscure law that allows offenders to ask the trial judge to reopen their cases in an effort to have their sentences reduced.
Judges can choose to release offenders or drastically reduce their sentences even if they've been denied parole and have lost all court appeals.
"Every time I get one of these letters, I think, 'When will we get our reconsideration?' " said Oliver Smith Sr. "We were sentenced to life, life without my son, with no possibility of parole or reconsideration."
Murders, kidnappers and child molesters are among those who have gotten their time behind bars reduced under the Maryland law.
The results can sometimes be devastating.
Shawn M. Henderson stabbed three people yet had his sentence of 12 years shaved to 10. The judge's action, plus good-time credits, allowed Henderson to get out of prison after six years, despite the fact he had been denied parole. Two years after he was released in 2008, he shot and killed a Gaithersburg woman.
Of the 100 persons convicted of violent crimes whose sentences have been reduced since 2002, 78 were in Prince George's County, according to documents provided by the Maryland State Commission on Criminal Sentencing Policy. Ten more came out of Montgomery County.
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The killers were caught and sentenced to long prison sentences. But Smith's family and other survivors of violence in Maryland say they are being repeatedly victimized by an obscure law that allows offenders to ask the trial judge to reopen their cases in an effort to have their sentences reduced.
Judges can choose to release offenders or drastically reduce their sentences even if they've been denied parole and have lost all court appeals.
"Every time I get one of these letters, I think, 'When will we get our reconsideration?' " said Oliver Smith Sr. "We were sentenced to life, life without my son, with no possibility of parole or reconsideration."
Murders, kidnappers and child molesters are among those who have gotten their time behind bars reduced under the Maryland law.
The results can sometimes be devastating.
Shawn M. Henderson stabbed three people yet had his sentence of 12 years shaved to 10. The judge's action, plus good-time credits, allowed Henderson to get out of prison after six years, despite the fact he had been denied parole. Two years after he was released in 2008, he shot and killed a Gaithersburg woman.
Of the 100 persons convicted of violent crimes whose sentences have been reduced since 2002, 78 were in Prince George's County, according to documents provided by the Maryland State Commission on Criminal Sentencing Policy. Ten more came out of Montgomery County.
Read more
1 comment:
Can you say vigilante!
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