54-year inmate loses fi rst parole bid

BATON ROUGE, La. — A 71-year-old Louisiana inmate whose case led to a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision on juvenile-offender sentences was denied parole Monday, more than a halfcentury after he killed a deputy sheriff at age 17.

A three-member panel from the state parole board voted 2-1 to keep Henry Montgomery imprisoned. The hearing was his first chance at freedom since his conviction decades ago, and a vote to free him would have had to be unanimous. He cannot request another hearing for two years.

The Supreme Court’s January 2016 decision in Montgomery’s case opened the door for about 2,000 other juvenile offenders to argue for their release after receiving mandatory sentences of life without a chance of parole.

Montgomery has served 54 years in prison for shooting East Baton Rouge Parish Deputy Charles Hurt in 1963, less than two weeks after Montgomery’s 17th birthday. In June, a state judge who re-sentenced Montgomery to life with the possibility of parole called him a “model prisoner” who seemed to be rehabilitated.

Montgomery’s attorneys said he has sought to be a positive role model for other prisoners, serving as a coach and trainer for a boxing team he helped form at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola.

But the two parole-board members who voted against Montgomery questioned why he hadn’t accessed more prison programs and services that could have benefited him. One of the panelists, Kenneth Loftin, also said he was disappointed in some of Montgomery’s statements during the hearing; Loftin didn’t elaborate.

James Kuhn, the other board member who voted against Montgomery, noted that the Louisiana Sheriffs’ Association submitted a statement opposing his release.