The Michigan Parole Board has rejected convicted drug dealer Richard "White Boy Rick" Wershe Jr.'s bid for a parole hearing, ending at least for the moment, any chance of parole before at least 2017.
Wershe, who was arrested when he was 17, and became a well-known figure in Detroit, was sentenced to life for drug trafficking under a now-defunct law that mandated life sentences for possession or distribution of more than 650 grams of cocaine or heroin. Wershe, now 42, has been behind bars for about 25 years, but has been eligible for parole because of a change in the law.
Wershe, calling from the state's Oaks Correctional Facility, told Deadline Detroit on Tuesday night that "I'm at a loss for words." He said he just can't understand why, after being imprisoned since his teenage years, he can't have a second chance.
He said he was supposed to have a pre-parole hearing on Aug. 20. The next step would have been to have a public hearing. He said he took preliminary tests for the possibility of parole and scored well.
But he said he was notified, without explanation, on Tuesday that the board wasn't interested in even meeting with him, and he would have to wait until at least 2017. He said a lot of disinformation about himself has been provided to the parole board over the years.
He's been rejected by the parole board in the past despite the support he's gotten from federal prosecutors and FBI agents.
When asked for comment Wednesday afternoon, a Michigan Department of Corrections spokesman said he would contact the Parole Board and see if he could provide any information on the matter.
Gregg Schwarz, a retired FBI agent, who once arrested Wershe and has kept in touch with him over the past 25 years, was highly critical of the decision. On Thursday, Schwartz, who has strongly advocated for Wershe's release told Deadline Detroit:
"It speaks of the obvious to say the recent rejection by the State of Michigan Parole Board of Richard "White Boy" Wershe is absurd and cruel. Members of the Parole Board have been notified prior to (the decision) that the information they have in the file for Wershe is false and that members who are sitting on the board have it out for Wershe."
Wershe's attorney attorney Ralph Marcelli appeared Wednesday on the Charlie Langton show on WXYT-Talk Radio this morning and expressed disappointment.
“He was anticipating having a pre-parole hearing on August 20, that would have set the stage as to when or whether they were going to give him a public hearing,” Marcelli said, adding, “He got a letter yesterday in prison saying they were not inclined to give him any consideration at all.”
(Of his next parole hearing in 2017, he said) : “That is the next time they said they would even consider granting him parole, which is absolutely absurd. He was 17 years old when he went into prison.
“Everybody else under that (law), he’s the only one still in prison that was imprisoned under that law, and that doesn’t even get into considering that he got involved in the drug trade in the first place at the behest of the Detroit Police Department and the FBI … They were using him to infiltrate the drug gangs on the east side.”To read more about White Boy Rick, click here to read an article written in Deadline Detroit in May.
