SALON

Tuesday, Aug 7, 2012 10:45 PM UTC

Kerrigan brother wants to go back to Mass. prison

By

Topics: From the Wires

BOSTON (AP) — Former Olympic figure skater Nancy Kerrigan’s brother, who was convicted of assault and battery in connection with their father’s death, wants to go back to prison to serve the remainder of his sentence.

Mark Kerrigan on July 27 was released early from prison, where he was serving 2 1/2 years following his May 2011 conviction.

Kerrigan, 47, is scheduled for a hearing in Middlesex Superior Court on Wednesday, when he is expected to ask a judge to return him to prison to serve out the remaining six months of his sentence, Probation Service spokeswoman Coria Holland said.

He is not accused of violating probation, she said, but by going back to prison he would be exempt from conditions of early release, including alcohol counseling, anger management classes and mental health counseling. While out of prison, he has to comply with those conditions or risk being sent back.

By asking to be sent back to prison, Kerrigan would have no supervision and wouldn’t have to comply with any programs when his sentence is over and he’s released.

Holland said Kerrigan “communicated his wish to complete his remaining six-month prison sentence.”

Kerrigan’s trial lawyer, Janice Bassil, did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment Tuesday. A Kerrigan family spokeswoman could not immediately be reached by phone.

The judge will decide if Kerrigan returns to jail, prosecutors said.

“We anticipate the judge will determine whether it is in the best interests of the community for the defendant to be returned to jail and then subsequently released without supervision or to be ordered to comply with the conditions of probation that the sentencing judge imposed,” said Jessica Venezia Pastore, a spokeswoman for Middlesex District Attorney Gerry Leone.

Prosecutors said Kerrigan caused his father’s death while in a drunken rage on Jan. 24, 2010. They said he put his hands around 70-year-old Daniel Kerrigan’s neck with such force that he broke cartilage in his larynx and triggered his heart failure.

Mark Kerrigan was acquitted of involuntary manslaughter in the death at the family’s home in Stoneham, just north of Boston. He received the maximum prison sentence despite tearful pleas for leniency from relatives including his younger sister, who won a bronze medal at the 1992 Olympics in Albertville, France, and a silver at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway.

Nancy Kerrigan, at the U.S. Championships in 1994, was clubbed on her right knee by an attacker during practice. An investigation revealed that rival Tonya Harding had knowledge of the planning of the attack, which left Kerrigan on the ground clutching her leg and crying “Why me?”

Harding’s ex-husband and two other men served time for planning and carrying out the attack. Harding, who didn’t win a medal, pleaded guilty to covering up the attack but didn’t serve any time. She received a lifetime ban by the U.S. Figure Skating Association and apologized in person to Kerrigan.

The Boston Herald first reported Mark Kerrigan’s request to go back to prison.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 0 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
New Yorker launches tool by Aaron Swartz to protect leaks: Strongbox, co-created by the late technologist, is an open-source drop box for leaked documents
215 points216 points | 7 comments
vote
New Yorker launches tool by Aaron Swartz to protect leaks: Strongbox, co-created by the persecuted late technologist, is an open-source drop box for leaked documents
164 points165 points | comment
vote
Loaded terminology like "entitlements" and "welfare" skews the debate and alters America. How right-wingers use semantic tricks to kill government.
111 points112 points | 32 comments
vote
Obstruction will ruin the GOP: Playing politics and abusing the system can excite the extremes, but it's a recipe for long-term political disaster
49 points50 points | 8 comments
vote
With the help of Photoshop, artist Yao Lu has made shanshui — traditional ink paintings — of China's landfills
27 points28 points | 1 comment

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations