EXECUTED 8 KIDS, IS FREE
Paroled 34 yrs. after ‘most brutal’ massacre
THE MERCILESS KILLER behind the “Palm Sunday Massacre” is free for Easter dinner this year.
Christopher Thomas, 68, was paroled Jan. 6 from the Shawanagunk Correctional Facility after serving more than 33 years for the April 15, 1984, executions of eight children and two adults.
The mass murder remains one of the most notorious in city history, with Thomas convicted of blasting all 10 victims in the head from close range with a handgun.
Parole might have seemed improbable at Thomas’ sentencing in September 1985, when Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Ronald Aiello labeled the ex-con as “the most brutal killer this court has ever encountered.” He imposed 10 sentences of 81/3 to 25 years in prison for a total of 83 to 250 years.
“I just hope you spend every day and every minute of that time in jail,” added Aiello.
But state law maxed out Thomas’ sentence at 50 years — although then-District Attorney Elizabeth Holtzman vowed to fight for the killer to do all five decades.
Thomas was denied parole five times between 2009 and his release, with the most recent in February 2017, according to sources.
The oldest victims were a 24-year-old pregnant woman and her 20-year-old cousin, while the rest of the dead were innocent kids between the ages of 3 and 14.
A blood-spattered 11-monthold girl was the lone survivor inside the Brooklyn home, and was later adopted by NYPD Officer Joanne Jaffe — who responded to the crime scene and later became the NYPD’s chief of community affairs and its highest ranking female chief.
Cops arriving at the bloodbath found the television still flickering and one victim clutching a spoon in her hand. All the victims were shot in the head point-blank with a .22-caliber weapon, cops said.
Thomas’ release marked the second time this month that the state parole board created controversy by voting to free an inmate linked to a heinous crime.
Cop-killer Herman Bell, 70, was granted his freedom during his eighth appearance before the board. He was convicted in the torture and executions of Officers Joseph Piagentini and Waverly Jones Sr. on May 21, 1971. Bell is set for release in April. Thomas was convicted of manslaughter rather than murder in the killings after a Brooklyn jury found the killer opened fire under the influence of drugs and extreme emotional distress.
The ex-con was addicted to freebase cocaine for two years before his violent explosion.
Prosecutors said the killings were committed in a jealous rage when the paranoid Thomas thought his wife was sleeping with the owner of the house, a convicted coke dealer named Enrique Bermudez.
Bermudez’s two daughters were killed, and the pregnant victim was carrying their third child.
Thomas, who became the target of a massive NYPD manhunt, was arrested shortly after the killings while locked up on unrelated charges of sodomizing and attempting to rape his mother.
He also served three years in prison after a 1970 attempted murder conviction.
Thomas will remain on parole through June 2034, when the killer will be 84 years old.