Double Murderer Released Early, Convicted of New Murder

The Los Angeles District Attorney has this press release on the case of previously convicted double murderer who has now been convicted of a third murder. If the laws in effect at the time of the first judgment had been enforced, the third murder victim would likely be alive.

On Sept. 17, 1995, 28-year-old Derrick Reese was using a payphone when Collins carjacked him. After taking the vehicle, Collins backed up and shot Reese at least twice, killing him.

On Sept. 28, 1995, Collins entered a diner in Inglewood where 44-year-old Thomas Weiss was working as a cashier. Collins held Weiss at gunpoint and demanded money. When Weiss did not comply, Collins shot him in the face, killing him.

Both victims were random strangers, murdered 11 days apart. On January 15, 1998, Collins was sentenced to 50 years to life imprisonment.

Both the multiple murder and robbery-murder special circumstances are obviously true, so Collins could have gotten death or life without parole for these killings, but 50-to-life would have seemed sufficient at the time to ensure that Collins would not get out until he was quite elderly, if at all. Yet Collins was released in 2020. Why?

Beginning in 2012, the U.S. Supreme issued a series of decisions regarding juveniles and life-without-parole sentences. Some of the cases in this long and winding road are discussed in a two-part post here and here. California, like many other states, had some problems dealing with these decisions, which were retroactive at least in part. The soft-on-crime contingent in the state legislature saw an opening, and they enacted a “remedy” that went far beyond the actual constitutional issue. They have since amended it repeatedly to expand the loophole even further.

In a nutshell, section 3051 of the California Penal Code makes most “youth offenders” eligible for parole after a given length of time in prison, 15, 20, or 25 years depending on the sentence category. A felon who committed his crime the day before his 26th birthday is a “youth offender” under the expanded definition. Advocates for such softening claim that incomplete myelination in the brains of young adults warrants this expansion, an example of what Prof. Stephen Morse calls “Brain Overclaim Syndrome.”

So Collins was eligible for parole in a far shorter time than the 50 years called for by his actual sentence for the crime. The Board of Parole Hearings is supposed to determine if an inmate is still dangerous, but predictions of future behavior are fraught with uncertainty. As Yogi Berra told us, it’s hard to make predictions, especially about the future.

Returning to the press release:

On July 2, 2021, less than a year after his release from prison, Collins killed Johnson in her apartment in the 7600 block of South Western Avenue. Johnson, 53, was found by her daughters and best friend bound, gagged and wrapped in a blanket.

Her cause of death was asphyxia due to neck pressure and possible smothering. Her wrists and ankles were tightly bound with shoelaces and duct tape, she was gagged with underwear, and duct tape was placed over her mouth and nose. Collins then stole her cell phone, jewelry and Lexus. Within hours of the murder, he pawned two of her necklaces and sold her vehicle for drugs.

Johnson, a mother of six and grandmother of eight who worked in a nursing home, had been sober for eight years. She was pursuing her nursing license at the time of her murder.

This law needs to be fixed.