Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, August 13, 1994 TAG: 9408150041
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Smith, now 41, pleaded guilty in March 1982 to two charges of second-degree murder. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
The bodies of Robert Mountford Jr. and Laura Susan Ramsay, both social workers in Ellsworth, Maine, were found in shallow graves.
They had been missing for about two weeks. Mountford was shot three times in the head; Ramsay was beaten and stabbed more than a dozen times.
The decision to deny Smith parole once again came fairly quickly after his July 20 interview.
John Metzger, chairman of the state's Parole Board, said three members of the five-member board cast votes between Aug. 4 and Wednesday.
"It's good news. We definitely want him to serve the full sentence," said Brian King, spokesman for the Appalachian Trail Conference based in Harpers Ferry, W.Va.
Metzger said the parole was not granted "based on the serious nature and circumstance of the offense."
Smith will have one more try at gaining parole next year before he is released on mandatory parole Oct.22, 1996.
Smith has been in the Baskerville Correctional Unit in Southside Virginia since August 1991, Metzger said. His file shows no disciplinary infractions.
Keith Neely, one of Smith's trial lawyers, said he rarely, if ever, has heard from Smith after his sentencing. Scarlet Ratcliffe, clerk of the Giles County Circuit Court, said his file does not include any recent correspondence.
Smith became eligible for parole in 1986. His file indicates several media inquiries and many letters opposing his parole from the families of both victims, Metzger said.