Molly and Tom Martens to walk free from prison within 60 days

Dad and daughter will have served just over four years for killing Jason Corbett in the US

Killers Tom and Molly Martens have entered the special pre-release phase of their US manslaughter sentences and will leave prison in less than 60 days.

The father and daughter will have served four years and three months behind bars for beating Irish father-of-two Jason Corbett (39) to death with a metal baseball bat and a concrete brick.

The pair are now liaising with parole officials as both will be released from separate North Carolina prisons by June 6.

US victim-support associations have been in contact with Mr Corbett’s family in Limerick and have formally confirmed both killers are scheduled to be released in less than 60 days time.

Mr Corbett’s family have been told that their next notification will only be when the two killers are formally released from custody in North Carolina.

While both releases are scheduled to take place on June 6, the release timing may change depending on a number of factors.

Tom (73) and Molly (40) had been scheduled to be released on June 27 but the date was brought forward by three weeks as they received extra credit for the time they have already spent in custody.

The father and daughter are completing four-year and three-month prison sentences for the voluntary manslaughter of Jason Corbett in North Carolina in August 2015. The Limerick widower was beaten to death as he slept in his luxury Winston-Salem home.

Molly and Tom Martens insisted they acted in self-defence that night after claiming Mr Corbett attacked his Tennessee-born wife. However, Mr Corbett’s family are adamant that he was killed because Ms Martens feared he would bring his two children, Jack and Sarah, back to Ireland amid worries over her mental health issues and increasingly bizarre behaviour.

The Limerick packaging industry executive had repeatedly refused to sign adoption papers which would have given Ms Martens, who he met when she travelled to Ireland to work as a nanny for the two youngsters, equal rights to the two children.

Molly and Tom’s killing of Mr Corbett left his two children orphaned.

Tom, who has been a model prisoner throughout his sentence, will now be released from a North Carolina prison on June 6. Molly will enjoy the same release date as her father – despite the fact she was cited for five separate violations of prison rules since 2017.

North Carolina Department of Corrections (NCDC) sources indicated that the earlier release date is not linked to inmate behaviour or co-operation with prison education programmes.

Instead, the father and daughter are being given 21 extra days credit for time served in custody in the build-up to their 2017 second-degree murder trial and the time they then spent in custody before being released following their successful challenge to their convictions to the North Carolina Supreme Court.

Judgment and commitment documents from Davidson County – where the pair were sentenced in both 2017 and last year – have been amended to reflect an additional 21 days of time served in custody.

When they are released in June, Tom and Molly Martens will then have to spend 12 months on parole in accordance with North Carolina offender regulations. They will not be allowed to live together as both will be officially regarded as convicted felons.

The former nanny – who has bipolar disorder – underwent a third psychiatric evaluation in recent months as she was placed on suicide watch in a North Carolina jail.

The NCDC caused controversy last Christmas with an embarrassing error which led to the father and daughter being wrongly given a jail release date in December – less than a month after they were sent back to prison for Mr Corbett’s manslaughter. It later revised the date to June 27 after admitting the error by the Central Records Office. That release date was later revised again to June 6.

Tom and Molly Martens agreed a plea-bargain deal with North Carolina prosecutors to voluntary manslaughter charges last November after they successfully appealed against their 2017 conviction for the second-degree murder of Mr Corbett.

Both had served three years and eight months of 20-25-year prison terms before their convictions were overturned by the North Carolina Supreme Court.

The voluntary manslaughter hearing – which heard emotional pleas for heavy sentences from Mr Corbett’s two children, Jack (19) and Sarah (17) – added just a further seven months to the Martens’ sentences.

During her time in custody on the second degree murder charge, Molly was cited for five prison rules breaches, ranging from refusing to obey the order of a prison guard to being in an unsanctioned area of the jail and to being in possession of non-dangerous contraband.

Despite the fact her earlier time in prison will count towards her voluntary manslaughter sentence, Molly is now considered a model inmate – and any record of her previous infractions had been wiped from her official NCDC status. The Corbett family never received a formal apology for the upset caused over the early prison release error.