A young man who was 14 when he shot and killed his family on a New Mexico ranch owned by newsman Sam Donaldson is expected to go free on Saturday, his 21st birthday, his lawyer said.
"This is Cody's last day," Gary Mitchell, defense attorney for Cody Posey, told CNN on Friday.
Posey had just finished the eighth grade when he was arrested on July 7, 2004, in connection with the slayings of his father, stepmother and stepsister.
He confessed to the slayings, but said he snapped after years of physical and psychological abuse. He said he fatally shot his father, Paul Posey, 34, stepmother, Tryome Posey, 44, and stepsister, Mairlea Schmid, 13, and then used a backhoe to bury their bodies inside a manure pile.
Posey was convicted in February 2006 of voluntary manslaughter for his father's death, second degree murder for his stepmother's death and first degree murder for his stepsister's death.
The state asked the court to impose the maximum adult sentence, life without parole. But Judge James Waylon Counts ruled that it was possible Posey could be rehabilitated and sentenced him as a juvenile offender. Once he reached 21, he could no longer be held as a juvenile and was free to go.
Posey turns 21 on Saturday, said his uncle, Carl Clees, and he is expected to leave the transitional center in Albuquerque that has been his home for the last six months.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/10/08/new.mexico.posey.release/index.html?hpt=T1
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