Virginia Parole Board Illegally Freed Killers In Secret Parole Meetings

If we thought bail reform was bad, wait until you see what the Virginia parole board head up their sleeve when they released a convicted cop killer without warning.

The Officer of the State Inspector General (OSIG) began investigating after the Virginia Parole Board released a killer who murdered a 23-year-old Richmond police officer during a traffic stop in 1979 without giving anyone a chance to object.
The late Richmond Police Officer Michael P. Connors stopped a car near Linden and Main Streets for traveling the wrong way down a one-way street at about 2:05 a.m. on Nov. 13, 1979, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.
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Officer Connors, 23, did not know that the occupants of the vehicle had just robbed a 7-Eleven store near Virginia Commonwealth University.
Testimony at trial revealed that when Officer Connors approached the getaway car, then 23-year-old Vincent Lamont Martin got out of the vehicle, The Hill reported.
Officer Connors told Martin to get back in the car, and Martin drew a handgun and shot the police officer in the neck

​Martin was subsequently convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death. During his time in prison he had been convicted of additional crimes. He had also been denied parole many times because of his violent history and excessive criminal record however, one year later, on April 10, without giving Officer Connors’ family or the Richmond Police Department the statutory 45 days to deliver victim impact statements or object, the Virginia Parole Board voted by a supermajority to grant parole to the cop killer, The Hill reported.

​The recently-release OSIG report said that the cases of Officer Connors’ killer and nine more convicted killers showed a pattern of violations of the law that centered on the parole board releasing the convicted murderers without giving notice to prosecutors or victims’ family members, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.
Prosecutors and family members are supposed to be notified and given time to object to the parole of a convicted person.
OSIG didn’t investigate whether the murderers in these cases should have been paroled, they just looked at whether the parole board had followed the process as stipulated by Virginia law, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.
“It appears that neither the rules nor the law were followed,” Suffolk Commonwealth’s Attorney Phil Ferguson said.

​Two more of the released convicted killers were granted geriatric releases from prison even though they hadn’t applied for them as is required by parole board policy, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.
The OSIG has recommended misdemeanor criminal charges be filed against the former parole board chair.