Thursday, Feb. 21, 2008
Killer up for parole
Jack Weinstein
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ReprintCarole Duffield said she feels as though her family got the life sentence instead of Michael Cade.
For the second time in 10 years, Duffield will tell the Kansas Parole Board not to release the man who brutally killed her two daughters 25 years ago.
On Monday and Feb. 29, the board will have public comment sessions for anyone who wants to argue against or advocate for Cade’s release.
His parole hearing will be in early March at the Lansing Correctional Facility. If granted parole, Cade would be released April 1.
Cade broke in to the Duffields’ home in January 1983 when he was 21. Using a two-pound sledgehammer, he bludgeoned 12-year-old Janelle to death and nearly killed 15-year-old Paul. Kelly, 17, was forced by Cade from the house, raped, beaten and left to die in a drainage ditch at Frisco Lake.
Cade was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and one count each of rape, aggravated kidnapping, aggravated battery, aggravated burglary and robbery.
Friends and family have made sure people don’t forget what Cade did to the Duffield family.
Susie Pietarila — a niece of John Duffield, the father, who died a few years ago — started circulating petitions and encouraging others to send letters to the parole board.
“(Cade) could very well be released,” she said. “We don’t want that to happen. This guy should never ever get out.”
Pietarila said the worst thing about Cade’s parole eligibility is that the family has to relive the attack.
“I just have great fears of him ever being a free man,” said Carole Duffield, who flew to Kansas City from her home in Phoenix. “It was such a random, heinous, unprovoked, ridiculous — I just can’t think of enough adjectives — act on his part. It just scares me to think that anyone else might have to go through what we went through.”
Cade was sentenced to life in prison, but he first was eligible for parole in 1998 because of state sentencing guidelines at the time, which are stricter now. In 1998, the board said Cade wouldn’t be eligible for parole again for 10 years, the maximum amount of time between parole hearings.
“I think life in prison should mean just that — life in prison,” said Paul Duffield, who cannot attend the public comment session.
If Cade had been convicted today, he would have been eligible for the death penalty, which was reinstated in Kansas in 1994.
Public comment sessions will take place from 10 a.m. to noon Monday at Kansas City, Kan., City Hall, 701 N. 7th St., and from 8:30 to 10:30 a.m. Feb. 29 in room 106A of the Landon State Office Building, 900 S.W. Jackson St. in Topeka.
Chief Deputy District Attorney Eric Rucker and Shirley Fessler, a victim’s advocate, will represent the Johnson County District Attorney’s Office on Monday.
Those wishing to voice their opposition or support in writing can fill out a written comment form online or download it and mail it to the board. Both forms can be found at www.dc.state.ks.us/kpb by clicking on the “Public Comment Sessions” link on the left side of the page.
There is no deadline for sending in written comments, board administrator Libby Scott said. Scott said the three-member board would review public and written comments and Cade’s testimony to decide whether he should be paroled in April and for what length of time up to 10 years. The board generally makes parole decisions about two weeks after an inmate’s hearing. Carole Duffield hopes the viciousness of Cade’s crime is enough to keep him behind bars and will tell that to the board Monday.
“I don’t know how many more times I’m going to be around to do this, but as long as I am, I’m going to do anything I can to keep him there,” she said.