by Kerry Dougherty
Last week we told you about Debra Scribner, the woman convicted of first degree murder in 2012 and released from prison earlier this month thanks to Gov. Ralph Northam’s let-em-all-out parole board.
This lucky lady served just eight years of her 23-year, 6-months sentence. She’s now back at her home on the Southside.
This week we’d like to introduce you to one more fortunate felon: Dwayne Markee Reid, 45. This Suffolk man was involved in two slayings. According to news reports in The Virginian-Pilot, “Reid was convicted in 1992 — when he was 14 — of robbing and murdering a man while he was with friends who were testing a new gun. That juvenile court verdict was later reduced to armed robbery. He served 11 months in juvenile detention before returning to the streets.”
Seven months after Reid got out of juvenile detention, he killed Thomas Runyon, 32, during a drug deal. This time he was tried as an adult.
The March 1995 news story in The Virginian-Pilot about Reid’s sentencing began this way:
Dwayne Markee Reid was involved in two murders on the same street within three years, both before he turned 17. But a judge on Thursday made sure Reid won’t return to Cullodan Street any time soon.
The newspaper quoted the prosecutor as he described what happened after Reid took Runyon’s money.
This defendant stepped back from the car, turned, pointed his gun and shot Thomas Runyon in the head. He shoots to kill and he murders Thomas Runyon for no reason. This was a killing for fun. I submit to you a killing for no other reason than to see what it felt like.
Killing for fun.
Reid was 18 at the time of his trial and the judge noted that one of the most disturbing aspects of the case was Reid’s complete lack of remorse for the murder.
Prosecutors asked for the death penalty, but the judge sentenced Reid to two life sentences instead. One for capital murder and the other for armed robbery, plus five years on firearms charges. The judge suspended one of the life sentences.
In a sane society homicidal maniacs would be locked up for life. But there doesn’t seem to be much sanity left in Richmond these days.
This convict spent 27 years in prison. But on April 3, Virginia’s parole board sent Suffolk’s Commonwealth’s Attorney, Phil Ferguson, what appears to be a terse form letter telling him that Reid had been granted parole.
The decisions of the parole board are final.
Ferguson has been sifting through similar letters about other violent criminals that are headed home. The freeing frenzy in Richmond continues.
Parole was abolished in 1995, but those sentenced before the law took effect are eligible for parole. Until recently that didn’t matter. Virginia’s parole boards almost never set violent felons free. Reid was denied parole in 2017.
“We’ve gone from a parole system, to no parole and now we’re back to the pre-1995 revolving doors,” Ferguson fumed yesterday. “Before ’95 criminals were convicted and sentenced to prison and a revolving door let them come back to the communities where we had to deal with them again and again.
“People are being released now who had life sentences or 100 years,” he continued. “These are murderers, rapists, armed robbers, people convicted of really, really serious crimes.”
“These people should never be released,” the prosecutor added. “Reid killed not one but two people. We should not be releasing him back into the same community where he committed his crimes.”
When I asked Ferguson why the parole board would make such reckless decisions, he said the releases are the result of a lenient new philosophy in Richmond.
“They see criminals as the victims,” he said of the members of the parole board. “They think everyone should get a second chance.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m not opposed to second chances, for some. But not for people who have committed the worst kinds of crimes.
“The parole board is interested in just getting people out of prison,” he sighed.
That’s alarming.
Next week we’ll introduce you to several more violent criminals who have been granted parole.
In the meantime, lock your doors.
And it might be a good idea to avoid Suffolk’s Culladan Street.
This column was published originally at www.kerrydougherty.com.
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