Prompted by murder of woman in North Utica motel by serial rapist Robert Blainey
State Senator Joseph Griffo announced Monday that the New York State Senate has passed legislation he has sponsored in response to the 2011 sexual assault and murder of a woman at a North Utica motel.
Senator Griffo, R-Rome, acted to introduce this bill (S2720) after 68-year-old Linda Turner was brutally killed in the motel she owned on Nov. 2, 2011, by serial rapist Robert Blainey, who had been released early from prison despite his own admission that “society is safer with me in prison.”
If signed into law, Senator Griffo’s bill would allow the state to deny violent felony offenders an early conditional release with parole supervision if there is convincing evidence that such an inmate would be an imminent threat to society. It would ensure violent felons serve their full sentence, without being given the opportunity for early release due to good behavior in prison.
According to state parole hearing transcript from 2008, the state Parole Board asked Blainey if he would be better off behind bars after raping two women in the 1980s. Blainey replied: “Yes. Society is safer. Society is safer with me in prison. I can sit here and tell you people I’m not going to do it, I’m not going to do it, but it’s not going to make a bit of difference. In your opinion and your eyes, I am a low-life rapist, which is true, and I’m not going anywhere.”
Although the state Board of Parole believed Blainey should not be released from prison at that time, the Parole Board did not have any legal authority to hold him any longer: Blainey was required to serve only two-thirds of his indeterminate sentence of 12 ½ to 25 years due to the merit time he accumulated for being well-behaved in prison.
Under current state law, the Parole Board had no option but to release Blainey as long as he signed the terms for his conditional release, even though he warned the board he may re-offend if sent back to Oneida County.
Senator Griffo said: “If someone has proven they are capable of hurting other people, and admit they would likely do it again, then I believe we have a duty to the victims of their crimes and to society as a whole to incarcerate these violent individuals for as long as legally possible.”
Griffo added: “No criminal should be allowed back out on the street without serving their full prison sentence if they themselves have acknowledged they will remain a dangerous threat to society. No victim of a future crime wants to hear, despite every warning the perpetrator would strike again, that a dangerous criminal was allowed to walk free before their prison time was complete simply because the State Parole Board’s hands were tied from holding them any longer. This proposed legislation would allow State Parole the discretion to keep a threatening inmate behind bars for as long as possible, and I encourage the Assembly to do what’s right to protect society.”
In the years since Turner’s death, a number of violent felony offenders have gone on to commit further violent crimes and murder after being released on parole, including most recently Demetrius Blackwell, the man accused of fatally shooting New York City Police Officer Brian Moore in May 2015
Senator Griffo’s legislation has now been referred to the Assembly for further consideration, where a companion bill is sponsored by Assemblyman Anthony Brindisi, D-Utica.