Letter to Parole Board Chairperson, Michael C. Eagan, in the Wake of my 5-Year Continuance

People will say anything to get their way. I might say anything for the chance to go home. It appears there are those who might say anything to keep me imprisoned. They are just words. They are not worth anyone's life. My deeds, your deeds are worth ten times the words people would use for, and against us.  

When I was a boy living in my rural community of Woodland Park during the '50s and the '60s, I would walk the woods, visiting old people. Sometimes I did chores for them, and they would pay me with a slice of pie, or a bowl of rice pudding. Sometimes I would just sit and listen to them talk. That pleasured them as much as anything. I would feel pleased, too. During those times I sat in the company of those elderly people, besides smiling at their stories, I rarely said a word.  

In the early '70s, when I lived in the dorms at Western Michigan University, I gained a reputation for being, not only a good listener but someone whom students came to trust with their feelings. Imagine my surprise that they would come to my door at all times of the day and night, just to talk. I listened to each, and every one of them.  

In the late '70s, while working for the Douglass Community Association's Community Mental Health Program, I spent time working a suicide hotline. With one lady, I employed the words of William Shakespeare to help pull her back from the brink. But, it wasn't the words so much as it was my manner that helped me help save lives. People trusted that I cared. (Why do you think they inducted me into the Alpha Kappa Mu Honor Society?) 

I am not a good person because I say so. I am a good person because, for the better part of my life, I have done so. Today, I ask for a second chance.  

Letter in Response to Kay D. Perry of MI-CURE (a prisoner advocacy group)

Thank you for responding to my initial letter regarding the results of my public hearing.

By the way, I never argued that intelligent, professional women "always" report abuse. I argued that this woman - Lillie Blue - a woman of courage whom I knew well, would never have tolerated a physically abusive relationship. When I am accused of something I did not do, there is no other way to prove a negative, all that is left for me to rely upon is her reputation, and mine.  

Prior to my crime, I had never hit a woman, and there is no evidence in my 44 years of living free - no police documents, nor domestic violence or assault complaints - to dispute that. What other argument is there for me, except that Lillie would never have allowed what her family accused her of allowing? They lied on her and on me. Then, the parole board used that lie to justify its decision. 

I would have imagined that MI-CURE might have been more critical of a parole board that relies upon unsubstantiated claims to keep 66-year-old prisoners imprisoned, rather than relying upon quantifiable facts, like:  "Zero" disciplinary points (2018); HIGH probability of parole (according to their own Parole Guidelines Scoresheet (2018); no previous criminal history; Master's degree from WMU (2000); certified braillist by the Library of Congress to transcribe textbooks (2001-2013); two published novels - The Pooka and the Paranormal (2005), and The King of Pearl (2008); excellent block reports, and work reports; etc., etc.  

Open Letter to Parole Board

Michigan Department of Corrections

Grandview Plaza Building

206 E. Michigan Avenue

Lansing, MI 48933

Re:  Larry R. Carter, 258499

Dear Members of the Parole Board:

The Michigan Parole Board conducted my public hearing on October 11, 2018, to determine whether I should be set free, and allowed to go home. All of those who testified were sworn to tell the truth, similar to how witnesses at a trial are sworn. When the testifying began, however, only my testimony was held to the fire. The other witnesses were not challenged, at all.

When the Blue family spoke, a number of its members wove a tale of repeated physical assaults by me upon Lillie. It was testimony the board would rely upon in rendering its decision to deny my parole. From the outset, the family’s testimony rang false. Lillie was an intelligent, professional woman. She would not have tolerated anyone battering her, and not have filed a single police report. Yet the review panel offered not a single challenge to their allegations, despite no photos of a battered or bruised woman, or a police report that hints domestic violence, or even a domestic disturbance complaint from my entire past. 

After my 87-year-old mother appealed to the review panel to let me “come home”, my brother, Marion Carter, got up to speak. I was encouraged until he opened his mouth. He is an older brother to whom I have always been loyal. Yet, he not only turned on me, but he also lied on me. He told the review panel, among other strange things, that I “had anger issues, even as a child.” 

The next day, I called my mother and asked her (rhetorically), “Do you think I had anger issues as a child?” She said, “Of course not.” Then, “Why,” I asked, “did Marion say the things he said at my hearing?” She answered, “I don’t know.”

Those witnesses swore to tell the truth. When a minimum of cross-examining might have revealed the contradictory, if not false, nature of their testimony, the two-man panel said nothing.

My brother had stepped forward in a public forum and made an outrageous claim that the parole board, in its Notice of Decision, calls “convincing.” They accepted his testimony without any medical evidence, police records, work records, or school records to back it up. Then, they used his claim to support a narrative that I “pose a risk to the public.” The parole board members know nothing about my brother, Marion. He might be crazy, for all they know. (I’m beginning to think that he is.) Yet, board members would wager my freedom by the first words they ever hear come out of his mouth.

In the six weeks between the day of my hearing and the 30^th of November, when the board rendered its decision, could not someone have bothered to look into the truth of Marion’s claim? At the least, someone could have contacted my mother, who is a much more reliable authority on my childhood than my brother, who is a mere year older than I. Instead, there was no apparent effort to corroborate Marion’s testimony. The board simply used it.

Why shouldn’t I, then, have imagined that the other witnesses’ testimonies – though important to their purposes – would not be allowed to impact the parole board’s decision? When I made my final statement, I did not challenge the previous witnesses’ false allegations. Though hurtful – especially my brother’s, who words still wound me deeply – I felt their testimonies must, otherwise, be harmless. How could I have known their words would be given such immense regard, and end up having such a devastating effect upon me and my family? 

There were other reasons the parole board denied my parole. They accused me of lying because I could not remember “key elements” of my crime. I was drunk and out of my mind that day in 1996. It is only some solace that I remember as much as I do, and half of that I do not trust to be fully factual. But, be assured:  I have always accepted full responsibility for what I did that day. I turned myself into the police and answered every question they asked me. I will never relinquish the remorse I feel for my violent and selfish act; neither will I let go of my shame. 

The review panel also derided my inability to satisfactorily explain the nature of our break-up, and its aftermath. Lillie was a complex individual, as was I. I had difficulty expressing to the review panel the complexity of our characters, and the nuances that continuously brought us back together, and then pushed us apart.

If this letter from me sounds desperate, think what 66-year-old, having served 22 years in prison, and then given another five-year term, besides, wouldn’t feel similar despair. And, that five-year continuance is not for something I did or did not do. The Michigan Department of Corrections, in its own Parole Guidelines Scoresheet dated 10-16-18, stated to me:  “Your guidelines score of 4 calculates to a HIGH probability of parole.” No, it is apparent that my five-year continuance comes down to a matter of semantics – my poor choice of words. What nation on earth – especially one that has recently passed a nationwide prison reform bill – gives a man five years in prison for his choice of words?

I came to prison with a lot of growing up to do. I’ve done a lot of that growing these past 22 years. There is still more growing to be done. (We never stop growing. It is simply a matter of whether that growth is for better, or for worse.) I might not have made a great impression during my hearing, but my determination to improve, to help make things grow “for the better” – for my family, for my community – has never been stronger. 

Today, I could have walked out of prison on my own two legs, gotten a job, and lived independently. After this denial, I wonder when, or if I ever get home, whether I will be more hindrance than a help. 

Whether I come home, or not, truly matters little to anyone as such as it does to my children, my grandchildren, and me. We do not have much, and all I have to give them is me. They are the only people in the world who truly need me.

The people at my public hearing called me “angry.” I am not angry. I am heartbroken.

Larry R. Carter, 258499

(Thank you for reading my open letter. If you agree with me and desire to see my case readdressed please contact the Parole Board and ask them to reconsider their decision.)