in Woburn, MA...34 years on the job and had never fired his weapon before Christmas Eve...he was going to retire in 2011...a shootout at a Kohl's with a paroled convict...
It was a horrible tragedy. I live close to the Woburn line, and I can tell you that the city is in mourning.
This is in no way a political thread, but to honor a fallen police officer
If you didn't want to inject other issues into the thread, then you shouldn't have sullied the thread by presenting your own controversial opinions about parole or the parole board.
This truly was a senseless killing.
I totally agree.
I am outraged at the MA parole board. The killer was a repeat violent man. Not to be political BUT MA is a very liberal state.
And better for it. But, living here or near here you should know, Massachusetts is about compassion for the less fortunate; it's not about being lax on criminals. We believe in and support law and order as much as any state. So that part of your comment is pretty far off-target.
With regard to the rest, a few minutes on Google and you can find parolees committing new violent crimes in just about
every state in the nation. Also this past week,
West Memphis,
Tennessee police have issued a capital murder warrant for Cedric Burks, for killing an elementary school teacher; Burks is on parole. In April 2008, Glenford Martinez was on parole for murder when he shot and killed his former girlfriend, on a
Chicago street. Also, note that the other slain police officer mentioned in this thread, Chat LeCroy, was from
Georgia. LeCroy's accused murderer Gregory Favors was released on bond on unrelated charges just 2 weeks before the State Trooper was gunned down during a traffic stop.
Short of keeping everyone ever accused or convicted of a violent crime in jail forever, or killing them all, parole is a reality in our society.
And indeed, neither keeping them in jail forever nor killing them is feasible: Our nation simply doesn't have the money to warehouse 1% or more of our population, and of course if we keep each one in jail forever that percentage would probably be a lot higher. And thankfully our nation doesn't have the blood-thirstiness to kill over 15,000 murderers every year.
We can rest assured that the parole board members are thinking long and hard about this this week, but don't think for a minute that you "know" that they made the wrong decision. Decisions are right or wrong based on the information available when they're made, not based on whether things turn out well or poorly after the decision is made. Second-guessing the parole board is unjustified. Let's honor the hero by respecting him enough to respect the legal system that he devoted his life to protect.
