FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: ASTORINO: NEW YORK PAROLE BOARD SHOULD RESIGN OVER IMMINENT AYALA RELEASE.
Vicious Murderer and Rapist of Two Westchester Moms.
Scheduled to be Released in Early September;
His Voting Rights Will be Restored.
Hudson Valley-Aug. 12...
The New York State Parole Board should resign in disgrace after voting to release from prison Samuel Ayala, a perpetrator of one of the most horrific crimes in Westchester County history, former two-term Westchester county executive and state senate candidate Rob Astorino today said.
Mr. Ayala beat, raped, and murdered two young Westchester mothers in a 1977 South Salem home invasion — in front of the mothers’ three- and six-year old children — with Mr. Ayala laughing throughout the home after 11 shots were fired into the women as they crawled to get to their children. The judge in the case, Justice Richard Daronco, went on record at sentencing that his 25-year-to-life sentence was the maximum he could give, making it clear to future parole boards that the vicious murderer belongs behind bars for life. Ayala’s accomplice, Willie Profit, died in prison in 2016. Family members were denied their right to appear before the Parole Board this year because of Covid-19.
“Westchester hasn’t forgotten Bonnie Minter and Sheila Watson, or their children,” Mr. Astorino said, “These loving families were visited by true evil that day, suffering the worst imaginable nightmare. But New York State Parole Board members clearly have forgotten the innocent victims here, and for that they should resign in disgrace. Samuel Ayala is a stone-cold killer and rapist, and this decision is as alarming as it is nauseating.”
Mr. Ayala, who refused to say at an earlier parole board hearing whether he would have killed the children had he not run out of bullets, will also have his voting rights restored under New York’s new, “progressive” criminal justice policies, the former county executive noted.
“Under one-party rule, New York has become a state that takes the side of criminals over the rights of victims and law-abiding citizens and that cannot continue,” Mr. Astorino said. “Cashless bail and other so-called criminal justice reforms are erasing years of public safety progress right before our eyes. Parole decisions like this one are an abomination. Westchester weeps for Sheila Watson, Bonnie Minter, and their surviving family members today. We will never forget what they suffered at Mr. Ayala’s hand.”
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