Tonawanda News — BUFFALO — A man who was a teenage honors student when he killed his family and a neighbor in 1985 has refused to accept parole conditions that could have gotten him out of prison next week.
John Justice, then 17, fatally stabbed his parents, John W. and Mary Dubill Justice, and 13-year-old brother, Mark, in their Kenmore home. Then he killed the neighbor, Wayne Haun, in a car crash that was an apparent suicide attempt.
He’s been scheduled for conditional release on Friday.
“He won’t be released,” said Linda M. Foglia, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections. “He’s got to accept the conditions in order to be released into the community.”
“What he’s probably doing is saying: ‘Don’t release me. I’ll serve the maximum and then I’m done. You’ll have no control over me,’” John R. Nuchereno, an attorney who previously represented Justice, said.
It’s the second time in recent years Justice has objected to the terms of his release, which include substance-abuse testing, travel restrictions, and granting his parole officer access to online accounts and electronic devices.
He was convicted in 1992 of first- and second-degree manslaughter in the deaths of his mother and neighbor.
An earlier jury found him not responsible by reason of insanity in the stabbings of his father and brother.
Justice has been in a series of state prisons and never was assigned to a secure treatment facility where he could receive the best possible care for his mental illness, Nuchereno said. “Now you tell me: Is he ready to come out? How could he be?”
In 2005, after serving 20 years, or two-thirds of his maximum sentence, Justice was conditionally released to a Buffalo halfway house. He was sent back to prison in 2007.
Justice said he staged threats against other people so he would violate parole.
Because of accumulated “good time” in prison, Justice received the conditional release date of Aug. 26.
He could opt to stay in prison until his maximum sentence expires on Sept. 7, 2015.
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