NATICK, MASS. (WHDH) – Two convicted killers pushed for parole Thursday, as a recent court ruling could let them walk free because of how old they were when they committed their crimes.
Appearing for the first time in public since he was convicted of murder more than 30 years ago, Richard Baldwin looked very different from the 16-year-old who killed Groveland teenager Beth Brodie because she wouldn’t date him.
In the 1990s, Baldwin was sentenced to life in prison. Since then, the state’s highest court ended life sentences for people who commit crimes as juveniles. That means Baldwin now gets a chance at parole.
“I take full responsibility for what I did to her. I’m deeply sorry,” Baldwin said Thursday.
The victim’s family showed up Thursday, just as they did back when the crime happened, to protest her killer walking free.
“If you want to change the law, change it going forward, but to change it retroactively, all it does is retraumatize the family,” Brodie’s brother Sean Aylward said. “For a long time before the law changed, we had good memories of Beth. We are forced now to set them aside. We have to think about him.”
At the parole board hearing, it was revealed that during Baldwin’s three decades behind bars, he had several recent incidents of violence.
“I had no hope of ever getting out so I sort of fell into the false rationale or warped mind frame, ‘You’re never getting out anyways so why do this or that,’” Baldwin said.
Gerard McCra, who converted to Islam and changed his name to Kuluwn Asar, also went before the parole board Thursday. In 1993, he murdered his mother, father, and 11-year-old sister in their Rochester home because of an argument about his then girlfriend.
“I’m sorry for it. She was my sister and she didn’t deserve it, my mother didn’t deserve it, my father didn’t deserve it,” Asar said Thursday.
Asar said since learning he could get parole, he’s taken classes, repented and rehabbed. But the Plymouth County District Attorney Tim Cruz said that even if the law has changed, he doesn’t believe Asar has.
“He was a danger in 1993, he is a danger today. I ask you to please deny his petition for parole,” Cruz said.
During the hearings, the parole board members have an opportunity to ask questions of both men. They will take the information and look at victim impact statement from families and loved ones, before making a decision in the months to come.
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