By: Elizabeth Vanesse

Virginia’s newly-inaugurated governor, Glenn Youngkin, targeted the shortcomings of the Virginia Parole Board during his campaign. Youngkin’s campaign promised law and order, stricter sentencing, and fewer releases.[1]

Although Youngkin’s campaign did target some structural issues within the Board itself, namely that it erred in not notifying a victim’s family before releasing a man who had been granted parole, fact checkers have raised concerns over the misleading nature of some of Youngkin’s campaign tactics[2]. One of Youngkin’s newest appointees, former Richmond police officer, Cheryl Nici, was featured prominently in a Youngkin advertisement back in 2021[3]. In that advertisement, which ran on numerous local television stations, Ms. Nici describes that in 1984, a man who had allegedly killed three people and attempted to kill another police deputy, shot her in the head[4]. Ms. Nici explains that “[e]very few years [she] has to rip those wounds open again to plead with the members of Terry McAuliffe’s parole board to keep the man who tried to kill me off the streets.[5]” Kenneth Wayne Woodfin, the man who shot Ms. Nici, was convicted in 1985 and sentenced to an extremely long prison sentence—three life terms and an additional 116 years[6]. He was first eligible for parole 29 years after his conviction and has been denied each time.[7] In their denials, the Board cited they cannot release him because he may be a danger to the community.[8] Despite the Board’s unequivocal denial of parole and warnings of safety, Youngkin’s ad strongly insinuates that Woodfin came dangerously close to being released on parole.

In reality, Virginia is considered one of the strictest states when it comes to granting parole.[9] From January through October of 2019, for instance, the Parole Board only granted parole for 5% of cases.[10] The Parole Board regularly posts all of its monthly parole decisions for the public to view, per Virginia Code § 53.1-136.[11] As such, all of the facts and figures that would undermine Youngkin’s campaign message of parole being freely handed out, threats of the “cop killer’s” release, and the immense risk of victims being revictimized are readily available to disprove those claims. However, it is clear that not many members of the public actually know how to access such sites, nor are they aware of the actual statistics of parole in Virginia.

William W. Hood, III argues that Virginia’s elections have only exacerbated these misunderstandings about parole: they have “provided a forum for equally petulant exchanges on parole. In recent elections, many Republicans running for state office have argued that the Democrat-managed Virginia Parole Board routinely releases on parole violent prisoners who still represent a threat to society. Unfortunately, Virginia Department of Corrections statistics that belie these widely disseminated opinions rarely are made available to the public.”[12] Although Wood’s argument that the Department of Corrections does not release their statistics is no longer true due to the updated Virginia code, it is clear that the public is not aware of the stringency of Virginia’s parole system and how rare release still is. The recent gubernatorial race is not the only reason everyday Virginians are unaware of the realities of parole, but this media misrepresentation of statistics surely contributed.

 

 

[1] Alex Thorson, What Youngkin’s parole board promise signals to Virginia’s criminal justice system, ABC 8 News (Nov. 8, 2021), https://www.wric.com/news/virginia-news/what-youngkins-parole-board-promise-signals-for-virginias-criminal-justice-system/.

[2] Glenn Kessler, Youngkin’s campaign targets McAuliffe’s parole record through dubious links, The Washington Post (Sept. 22, 2021), https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/09/22/youngkin-campaign-targets-mcauliffes-parole-record-through-dubious-links/.

[3] Id.

[4] Id.

[5] Id.

[6] Id.

[7] Id.

[8] Mark Bowes, In victory for his victims, local man who killed 3 and wounded 2 officers in 1984 rampage is denied parole, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Jun. 18, 2021), https://richmond.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/in-victory-for-his-victims-local-man-who-killed-3-and-wounded-2-officers-in/article_2192f801-5d85-5802-b998-7577acab2ce0.html.

[9] Emma Gauthier & Anna Madigan, Virginia denies vast majority of parole requests, data shows, WHSV 3 (Dec. 17, 2019), https://www.whsv.com/content/news/Virginia-denies-vast-majority-of-parole-requests-data-shows-566283111.html.

[10] Id.

[11] Va. Code Ann. § 53.1-136.

[12] William W. Hood, III, The Meaning of “Life” for Virginia Jurors and its Effect on Reliability of Capital Sentencing, 75 Va. L. Rev. 1605, 1621-22 (1989).