NEW YORK (1010 WINS) -- The New York State Board of Parole has voted to release a man who raped and murdered two Westchester County mothers nearly 45 years ago as their children listened, according to a report.
Samuel Ayala and two accomplices raped and fatally shot Bonnie Minter and Sheila Watson during a home invasion at Watson’s home in South Salem in 1977, the New York Post reported. Their young children were playing together inside the home when the attacks happened, according to the outlet.
On July 20, the state parole board voted to release Ayala “as early as Sept. 3,” despite Minter’s children’s fight to keep the board from freeing him, the outlet reported.
Jason Minter and his sister were “unable to meet with a board member due to their rules regarding COVID on this last parole cycle hearing,” he wrote on Facebook.
“We can only speculate that COVID and the lack of in-person accessibility might have impacted our ability to resonate with the board as it had in previous years,” said Minter, who has successfully petitioned for Ayala’s confinement every two years since he became parole-eligible in 2002.
“We know the board was aware that Ayala joked and laughed at his prowess during the rapes,” Minter said. “They also knew that we very vividly remember his cackling laughter as he raced down the stairs and through the house that day after personally firing the multiple bullets that killed both my mom and her friend as they crawled away.”
A representative for the parole board told the Post it would have to file a request through the Freedom of Information Act to obtain a copy of the July 20 parole board hearing transcript.