Free Republic

The monster who raped me is coming before the board of parole again. Every 3 years. I ask that anyone who may have a reason to want him to stay behind bars, please consider writing the board (by email) expressing their thoughts about his release. He is a 5-time felon. The attack happened in Texas, the day before Thanksgiving, 1990. He broke several locks on my front door. When he was raping me, he made it clear to me that I would not be his last victim. He told me that if I helped prosecute him, he would kill me...

Prosecutors are using a new state law lengthening the gap between parole hearings to keep convicted child killer Diane Downs from coming before the board again for a decade. Downs, whose conviction for shooting her three children and killing one outside Springfield in 1984 inspired the Ann Rule book "Small Sacrifices," is scheduled for a parole hearing Friday. The 55-year-old has been locked up more than 25 years for the shootings. State law had required release hearings every two years for more than 1,500 prison inmates eligible for parole consideration, but a new law that took effect last January lengthened...