Parole Board

Described by the victim's family as a coldblooded murderer with "misspent intelligence," former Johns Hopkins University student Robert J. Harwood Jr. was sentenced to 35 years in prison yesterday for shooting his former friend outside a campus Republican club meeting.Harwood, 23, would normally be eligible for parole in 17 1/2 years. But as part of a plea arrangement in Baltimore Circuit Court, a judge is recommending him for a prison psychiatric program at the Patuxent Institution that could grant him an earlier release.

An article Saturday about former Old Court Savings and Loan President Jeffrey A. Levitt's parole inaccurately named Harry J. Taurig as being a state parole commissioner. Mr. Taurig was replaced on the parole commission in June by Patricia K. Cushwa, who voted for paroling Levitt.The Sun regrets the errors.Jeffrey A. Levitt, the savings and loan swindler who pleaded guilty to stealing $14.6 million from his own thrift, will be paroled in a year, after serving 7 1/2 years of his 30-year prison sentence.

NICHOLAS MONTOS, 92 First to make FBI's most-wanted list twice Nicholas Montos, the oldest prison inmate in Massachusetts and a career criminal who was the first person to make the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list twice, died Sunday, Department of Correction spokeswoman Diane Wiffin said. Montos was serving 33 years to 40 years for robbery in state prison in Norfolk. He made the FBI's most-wanted list in 1952 after he and two other men pistol-whipped a 74-year-old man during a robbery in Georgia.

A file photo of Terrence Johnson in yesterday's editions of The Sun should have been credited to the Prince George's Journal.The Sun regrets the error.At 31, Terrence G. Johnson has spent most of his life behind bars for killing two Prince George's County police officers -- and many people bitterly disagree over whether he belongs there.This week, Johnson, who was convicted in 1979 of manslaughter and a handgun violation in a racially charged trial, will ask an Anne Arundel County judge for his freedom.

TO: Mark David Chapman. From: Someone whose favorite Beatle was John Lennon, thank you very much. Subject: Your pending parole board hearing. I read where you said you might have murdered John Lennon to punish your father. You said your father never told you he loved you. "Perhaps I was getting him back, killing John Lennon," you told a British tabloid. Bravo! This is Beatles music to my ears. Ever since you gunned down Lennon 20 years ago, I have been waiting for a rational explanation.

This is a story in which everybody did the right thing. The victims, the cops, the prosecutors, the judge and the jailers conspired to get a case right. No excuses needed or sought. No apologies required or offered. They did what they were supposed to do, and the bad guy went to prison. Yes, in Baltimore. So, of course, there's a twist. It came in the form of a letter from the Maryland Parole Commission to the 66-year-old mugging victim's son-in-law who lives in Laurel. The man they had worked so hard to put behind bars has a parole hearing scheduled for July.

DEATH by murder is no stranger to me. I have been dealing with its pain and sorrow for 16 years.On Feb. 3, 1975, I became one of the 23,000 homicide victims that year with the murder of our first-born and only son, Stuart. The stress of murder in our family has been enormous; the worst part has been dealing with the criminal injustice system.The murderer, an escaped convict, was caught. I traveled to Southern Maryland for three days to attend the trial. I accepted the judge's conviction and sentencing of 30 years, plus five years for the handgun violation.

Maryland is facing a serious budget crisis. One way the state could save money is by improving the parole system. This is a subject I know something about. I spent decades in the Maryland prison system, serving a life sentence for a crime I didn't commit, before I was exonerated. While my situation was unusual, there are many people serving long sentences in state prisons who pose little threat to society and are deserving of parole. The state could save millions of dollars, while still preserving public safety, by releasing many low-risk individuals onto parole.

NEW YORK - Prison officials say that nearly 10,000 inmates in New York and thousands of other prisoners across the region are infected with hepatitis C, a liver infection that is difficult to treat, has no definite cure and, over many years, kills 5 percent of those who contract it. Prison and public health officials are wrestling with how to respond to the alarmingly high rates of infection, trying to figure out both how to contain its spread, and...

It's been 16 years since Lois Hess' only son was murdered, and she thought the grieving would be over by now. She was wrong.Recently, Mrs. Hess learned that the man convicted of themurder was scheduled to have a parole hearing March 25. The news threw her into an emotional tailspin, bringing back the hurt and anger as if the slaying had just happened."