Pastor convicted of killing as a teen gets chance at parole, in legal victory for Jason Williams

Jun 14

by Matt Sledge ~ NOLA.com

The case quickly emerged as a test of Williams’ powers. The District Attorney’s Office and Lingle’s defense attorney, Kristen Rome of the Louisiana Center for Children’s Rights, both objected to her decision and appealed.

In a May 4 written ruling, Herman explained her reasoning. She repeated at length a summary of McLeod’s killing, then argued that Williams was bound under state law by Cannizzaro’s decision to seek a judicial hearing on Lingle’s sentence.

"The statutes allowed for no additions to the list of defendants past the deadline, nor do they contemplate deletions from the list," she said.

Herman was saying that she should get to decide whether Lingle would ever become parole eligible, no matter what the city’s new district attorney said.

In the appeals court decision this week, Judges Terri Love and Regina Bartholomew-Woods ruled otherwise.

They said that under Louisiana law, prosecutors have broad power over life-or-death decisions like whether to seek capital punishment. And just as with the death penalty, the law gives district attorneys the power to reverse those decisions, they said.

Judge Joy Cossich Lobrano dissented from Love's majority opinion.

In a statement, Williams said he was glad the court affirmed his power. "The decision allows rehabilitation and parole professionals at the Department of Corrections, who are charged with determining if Mr. Lingle’s prison sentence has served its purpose, to do what they were appointed to do," Williams said.

The organization representing Lingle, the Louisiana Center for Children's Rights, also praised the court's ruling.

“Too often, we see prosecutors use their immense discretion to seek the most extreme sentences. In this instance, we saw a DA use his discretion to do the right thing and not pursue a death-in-prison sentence. We are glad that the 4th Circuit affirmed his power to do so, especially in this case," said the group's executive director, Aaron Clark-Rizzio.

Lingle is immediately eligible to seek parole, his lawyers say. However, state law does not guarantee his release, and McLeod's relatives could argue against it at a Parole Board hearing.

In court motions, Lingle has claimed he's worthy. He said he entered prison a teenager without a high school degree, but inside the prison managed to graduate with a bachelor’s from the New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. He also volunteered to leave the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola to serve as a chaplain’s assistant at a satellite prison.

“This court does not have to look at the then 15-year-old child and guess whether or not he will grow up to be a reformed, responsible, contributing member of society – we already know the answer is yes,” Lingle said in 2016.

After his conviction for slashing a housekeeper to death at age 15, Scott Lingle was never supposed to leave prison.

But the Louisiana 4th Circuit Court of Appeal voted 2-1 last week to hand a chance at freedom to the teenage killer turned prison pastor, and a legal victory to Orleans Parish District Attorney Jason Williams.

The court found that under state law, Williams could clear the way for Lingle to pitch the state Parole Board, despite the objections of Chief District Judge Karen Herman. The panel’s decision affirms Williams’ power in one of his few face-offs with a criminal court judge thus far.

The roots of the decision lie in a grisly crime scene four decades ago and changing attitudes about how to hold young killers accountable.

Lingle is now a Class A trusty and a chaplain’s assistant at a state prison who presents himself as the model of rehabilitation. But decades ago, he was notorious for his conviction in the killing of a 60-year-old housekeeper named Janet McLeod.

Police said McLeod was stabbed in the head, neck, chest and torso inside the Gentilly house of a 98-year-old woman for whom she was caring. Her death was caused by slashes to her throat.

Lingle protested his innocence through two murder trials -- the first ended in a hung jury, the second with his conviction -- but in recent years he’s accepted responsibility.

In one motion, Lingle said that he started abusing drugs in the 5th grade, and that faced with the prospect of being returned to his abusive father, he responded “in the most unthinkable way.”

Lingle’s appeals long went nowhere, but in a 2016 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that life without parole sentences should be reserved only for the “worst of the worst” juvenile offenders.

Louisiana responded with a process meant to identify the state’s most incorrigible. The state would grant parole eligibility to young killers after 25 years of imprisonment, unless district attorneys filed notice that they would seek to re-impose a life without parole sentence at a special court hearing.

Former District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro filed dozens of notices seeking court hearings on whether to keep juvenile lifers locked up forever, at one of the highest rates in the state. However, when Williams came into office on Jan. 11, he quickly moved to reverse course and shunt the cases to the Parole Board instead. He's argued that young offenders deserve second chances, since society often failed them and their brains were still developing at the time of their crimes.

Orleans Parish Criminal District Court judges have largely stepped aside. Yet Herman, a former prosecutor, put her foot down when it came to Lingle. She denied prosecutors’ attempt to withdraw their intent to seek a life without parole sentence. Instead, she wanted to move ahead with a full hearing on whether to grant Lingle parole eligibility.