Brother of ex-Death Row Scot must stay in jail

THE brother of former Death Row inmate Kenny Richey has lost a bid to be freed from an American prison after a judge ruled that he will have to complete his sentence for murder.

Tom Richey, who was jailed for 65 years for murdering a man and assaulting another while high on LSD, was hoping to be re-sentenced after trying to exploit a legal loophole. His lawyers argued that his charge of "attempted felony murder" was not on the statutes of Washington State, and therefore their client should never have been convicted and sentenced for that offence.

But in a court hearing last week, the judge agreed to effectively change the wording of the charges against him but ruled that "all other terms of the original judgement and sentence shall remain in full force and effect".

A spokeswoman for the county clerk office in Pierce County confirmed that the 42-year-old would have 30 days to appeal against the ruling.

Kenny Richey, who spent 21 years on Death Row before being released, today said he was "devastated" by the setback to his brother's case.

He said: "I'm really angry about this. They have taken enough time out of Tom's life already. He made a big mistake but he's paid for it and then some. He was only 18 and just a boy when this happened. He's sorry and he's done his time.

"We were hoping to be able to reunite as a family so we'll just have to wait and see what happens next. Tom will definitely appeal against this decision."

Stephen Trinen, Pierce County deputy prosecuting attorney, said that wording which was a "little ambiguous" had been corrected, but that Richey's convictions for murder and attempted murder had been in no way altered. He also revealed that Richey had already filed a separate challenge in April, adding that this would take between two and three years to come to court.

He said: "He is attempting to do whatever he can to shorten his sentence and so in the course of doing that he is willing to employ whatever legal theories serve that goal as opposed to serving a consistent legal theory. Saying that, at any time he may find a legal theory that the court find persuasive and then things could be re-opened again."

Richey applied for a transfer to Scotland in 1997 after spending ten years behind bars, but was rejected in part because the Scottish Prison Service could only guarantee that he would spend "a life sentence of 25 years".

In a letter to the Evening News from prison, Richey said: "I committed a crime and I deserved punishment, but I've served more time than most prisoners in Washington serve for similar offences, and one of my convictions, as well as the sentence, was unlawfully imposed."

Following his conviction in 1986 for shooting two shop workers, Richey spent a year on death row before a plea bargain saw him jailed instead.