Parents put their children on the school bus each morning, trusting they’ll return home.
Seniors walk their dogs, assuming their neighborhoods are safe.
These are not luxuries; they’re the most basic expectations of a functioning society.
Yet dangerous legislation in Albany again threatens that safety.
Two radical bills — the Elder Parole Bill and the Fair and Timely Parole Act — will open prison doors and allow convicted murderers and violent criminals to walk free.
As Suffolk County’s district attorney, I cannot remain silent while public safety is sacrificed for ideology.
Thousands of cases illustrate the insanity of these two bills, though I need only two from the Long Island’s recent past to prove my point: Colin Ferguson’s commuter-train massacre and the murder of 8-year-old Thomas Valva.
The Elder Parole bill is peddled as a mercy mission: it would let inmates over 55 who’ve served 15 years plead for parole.
It sounds compassionate — until you realize who’s in line.
Colin Ferguson, the monster who murdered six innocent Long Island Rail Road commuters in 1993, leaving 19 others injured, in a cold-blooded shooting rampage, is 67 now, well past the bill’s age threshold.
Do we want to put him in front of New York’s notoriously lenient parole board every two years? Fifteen years doesn’t erase the blood on his hands.
Even if parole is denied, why would we want to drag the families of the victims — people just trying to get home from work who were sitting in a train car — to a parole board hearing every two years to relive the worst day of their lives?
The parole process is notoriously antagonistic to victims, their families and prosecutors, and it’s only getting worse, with most victims reporting that they seldom, if ever, receive timely notification of parole hearings.
That’s not compassionate, and it is not just. Reaching middle age does not undo evil.
Then there’s the Fair and Timely Parole Act, an ironic name for a dangerous game.
It rigs the parole hearing, changing the rules by mandating that parole decisions be based primarily on current risk rather than past actions, virtually giving a pass to violent offenders.
Consider Michael Valva, the ex-NYPD cop convicted in Suffolk County for the 2020 murder of his own son, Thomas.
This wasn’t a one-off lapse in judgment — Valva and his fiancé, Angela Pollina, starved and beat 8-year-old Thomas and forced him to sleep in a freezing garage until he died of hypothermia.
The case had multiple examples of this child’s tortured existence in this house of horrors.
Valva’s 25-years-to-life sentence reflects the depravity of his actions.
Should his “good behavior” in prison someday outweigh the tragic horror of Thomas’ life?
This bill says yes, prioritizing a convict’s progress over a child’s stolen life.
That’s not fairness; it’s insanity.
Let me be clear: I believe in rehabilitation and second chances.
But I also believe that some acts are so heinous, so depraved, that those who commit them forfeit the right to walk freely among us.
I also believe powerful, durable sentencing deters crime.
There is a line — and Albany is trying to erase it.
New York has already suffered enough from the effects of misguided criminal-justice reforms.
“Bail reform” ties the hands of prosecutors and judges, flooding our streets with repeat offenders.
The result?
Spikes in violent crime, overwhelmed law enforcement and a growing sense of fear in our communities.
We cannot allow these parole bills to be the next wave of reckless policy.
What’s most infuriating is the disconnect between Albany’s legislative chambers and the real-world impact these bills will have: A mother’s fear of running into her attacker at the store.
The pain of a family that must relive a loved one’s murder at recurring parole hearings.
These bills will retraumatize victims, upend hard-won peace and make neighborhoods less safe — all to satisfy a political agenda that prioritizes criminals over communities.
And there is a very real threat that these bills will be garner enough Democratic and Working Families Party votes to pass this year.
New Yorkers must speak out.
Contact your state senator and assembly member.
Demand that they oppose Elder Parole and the Fair and Timely Parole Act.
Demand that they remember the victims.
Demand that they remember their duty to public safety.
Ray Tierney is the Suffolk County district attorney. He has been a prosecutor for over 30 years.
