New parole system may answer critics Post staff report A new parole system which uses measurable risk factors to decide if a prisoner will go free —rather than the discretion of parole board members—will go into effect next month. The new system has been used on a limited-trial basis since last summer, said Bob Prosser, spokesman for the Ohio Department of Rehabilia- tion and Corrections. Current methods have come under fire recently after several parolees have been arrested for violent crimes. On Thursday, William R. Vir- gil, 35—who is being held in the Hamilton County Justice Cen- ter on a parole violation—was charged by Newport police in the April 13 death of Retha Please see PAROLE, 2BParole From Page 1B Welch, 54, of Columbia Street in Newport. Ms. Welch had been beaten in the head and slashed two dozen times. Prosser said Virgil, who has ican Se raealedl from prison Jan. 20 because he passed a number of criteria set by the state parole board. Parole records indicate that Virgil has spent most of the it 14 years behind bars for Erimes he committed in Hamite ton County. He received a 10-25 year prison sentence in Decem- ‘ber 1973 for armed robbery. He was paroled In, August 1975, He was sentenced in Novem- ber 1976 to 4-25 years in prison for rape; he was paroled in March 1962. He was sentenced to 2-15 years in prison in March 1983 ‘for burglary, carrying a concealed weapon and recelving stolen property. He was paroled in June 166s. He violated parole in October 1985 and on this past Jan. 20. He ay violated parole April 16 and was arrested in Cincinnati. Prisoners being considered for parole under the new system will receive a score based on factors that include prior con- victions, their age at the time of théir first conviction, employ- ment history, alcohol or drug problems and any previous:pa- role supervision. prisoners in one of five groups, with those who have limited criminal histories recom- mended for parole. Violent of- fenders with long criminal records would be prohibited from receiving parole with cer- tain exceptions. Parole consideration for pris- oners who fall in-between the two extremes can be delayed for several months or years. Virgil is at least the fourth violent offender to receive pa- role and then commit or at- tempt murder in Greater Cincinnati since 1981. The oth- ers: ® Allen Holloway was freed uiter serving less than five years of a 4- to 5-year sentence for fslonious assault. He had been free on parole for less than three weeks when he beat an Over-the-Rhine woman to death in her ent on Aug: 6, 1984. He now awaits execution on death row. x @ Robert Gibbs, a murderer who served 10 years of a life sentence, shot and killed a 5- year-old Walnut Hills boy and Seriously wounded the boy's mother one year after receiving te, He ead himealt Ane 16, 1983 when surrounded by po- lice. @ Earl Elder was released from prison and placed in a re- habilitation center in 1981 afte? serving four years of a 5- to 25+ year sentence for voluntary manslaughter. He slit the throat of an 18-year-old Ov- er-the-Rhine woman. On July’, 1961, Elder raped, strangled and put the head of a Norwood woman in a gas oven. She i$ totally incapacitated. Elder re- ceived a 14- to 50-year sentence for rape and attempted aggra= vated murder. While not an Ohio case, Melvin Moreland—the St. Louis man who murdered Cincinnati Police Officer Clifford George sith hisown gn April 16 before he was to death by po- lice—was on parole.