March 16, 2008 12:31 am
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On April 7 the Mississippi Parole Board will meet and decide whether Ken C. Strickland will be allowed parole and be set free.
Ken C. Strickland, as a lot of you remember, was sentenced to life imprisonment for the brutal murder of Gary Thrash in 1991. Ken Strickland at 19 was arrested for burglary and placed in the Lauderdale county jail. He then along with David Duplantis escaped from the Lauderdale county jail. They broke into the former Meridian stock yard and stole a pair of bolt cutters .They then continued on to a secluded house just off the Chunky exit and broke in. Ken Strickland had once lived in this house with his family. A neighbor knowing that it was a good possibility that Strickland would go there, called to let Gary Thrash know this because his ex-wife was renting this house. The neighbor was concerned that Gary Thrash’s daughter would go to the house and check on the house as she normally did for her mom while she was out of town working. Upon checking on the house, Gary Thrash was ambushed by Strickland and Duplantis and beaten to death with the bolt cutters. After the murder Strickland and Duplantis stole Gary Thrash’s truck and escaped to Tennessee. There they kidnapped a man and had a car chase with authorities before being arrested. Both Strickland and Duplantis were brought back to Mississippi to be tried here.
Ken Strickland was tried in Carthage and found guilty of capital murder. An expert witness testified at that trial that Strickland was the one who held the bolt cutters during the beating due to impression on his hands. The jury voted 11-1 to give him the death penalty. Since the one person would not vote for the death penalty, the court had to go to the next sentencing option. At the time of the trial, life without parole was not a sentencing option because his juvenile record couldn’t be used against him. Therefore he was given the sentence of Life in prison with the possibility of parole. He is now up for that parole. To help keep our communities safe, please write to the Mississippi Parole Board and contest his release. All letters must include his name and his Department of Corrections number as follows: Ken Strickland –MDOC# 75732. Letters need to be mailed to the Mississippi State Parole Board, 201 West Capitol Street, Suite 800, Jackson, MS 39201
Ken Strickland has been in trouble with the law since he was a juvenile; his crimes escalating from simple burglary to murder and many in-between. This is a man who should not be allowed back into our community. We, as the family of Gary Thrash have experienced the heart ache of losing him, endured the pain of going through three murder trials, and now we have to relive these past event to try and keep the man who was tried and convicted of his murder in prison. This will be an ongoing process for us as long as Strickland is in prison. This is something we are willing to do because we are not willing to run the risk of running into him on the streets in our community or him harming or killing someone else and their family having to go through what we have already had to bear. We hope and pray no other family has to face the pain we have endured losing a love one in such a senseless way. We are only asking for your help in continuing to serve the punishment our justice system sentenced him to by a jury of his peers after a fair trial. We have been told by several people that Strickland has served his time and has paid his debt and won’t help or there are those that say they don’t know enough about the case so they wouldn’t help. It is your right to feel this way, but if you do I hope and pray he doesn’t move into your community.
Please take a few minutes of your time to help keep our communities safe and keep this convicted felon off our streets for your families’ sake and ours.
Sheryl Thrash West
On behalf of The Family of Gary Thrash
Hickory
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