The meeting of the full Kentucky Parole Board was held Monday morning and members unanimously voted to keep Michael Carneal in prison to serve out his life sentence.
Carneal, now 39, told parole board members last week he would live with his parents and continue his mental health treatment if they agreed to release him. He admitted he still hears voices like the ones that told him to steal a neighbor’s pistol and fire it into the crowded lobby of Heath High School in 1997. However, Carneal said that with therapy and medication, he has learned to control his behavior.
Carneal was convicted of killing three of his classmates and shooting five others at Heath High School in Paducah back on December 1st, 1997. He was a 14-year-old freshman at the time and got sentenced to life in prison with the option for parole after 25 years.
Several of those wounded in the shooting and relatives of those who were killed also spoke to the parole board panel last week. Most expressed a wish for Carneal to spend the rest of his life in prison. Carneal told the panel there are days he believes he deserves to die for what he did, but other days he thinks he could still do some good in the world.
Parole Board Chair Ladeidra Jones earlier told Carneal their “number one charge is to maintain public safety.” She informed him that his inmate file listed his mental health prognosis as “poor” and says he experiences “paranoid thoughts with violent visual imagery.”
Source: AP
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