“In the spring of 2014 when the parole board basically blocked Beach’s application for clemency and refused to forward that to the governor, even though he has written to them and requested that he be given the opportunity to weigh in on it, I felt that signaled to me that that there was something broken in our system”.
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Beach was serving a 100-year sentence with no possibility of parole for the 1979 beating death of Kimberly Nees, 17, on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation, in northeast Montana.
Bullock publicly supported Beach previous year when he wrote a letter to the parole board suggesting it not consider whether he is guilty or innocent, but whether he had served enough time in prison.
November 20: Beach is freed from prison after Gov. Steve Bullock grants his clemency request.
A man whose 100-year murder sentence was commuted by Montana’s governor walked out of prison still clad in the blue shirt of an inmate, shivering in the 25-degree weather that greeted him after three decades of incarceration.
Beach maintained he was coerced to confess after hours of intense interrogation.
Beach was released for 18 months beginning in 2011 after a state judge ordered a new trial based on witness testimony that Nees died in a fight among a gang of girls.
“Something has to be proven to me, and it hasn’t been proven yet”, said Glenna Nees Lockman, the victim’s older cousin.
“It’s nearly over”, said Stella Ziegler, a longtime Beach supporter in Billings. Jon Tester, former Gov. Brian Schweitzer and former Republican US Sen. “I’m sitting here looking at that mountain, and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve prayed, looking in that direction at God’s creation”.
Bullock noted Beach was a 17-year-old juvenile at the time and had exhibited good behavior in prison. Beach filed a new request days after the law took effect October 1, and his case went straight to Bullock three weeks ago. Beach has five times requested clemency.
Barry Beach in 2011, during his earlier, brief release from prison.
“Mr. Beach committed his crime as a juvenile, served 30 years for that crime, has conducted himself appropriately both inside and outside of prison, and if his sentence were commuted, he would continue under state supervision”, Bullock said in the letter. During his time on the outside, Beach worked at the Clocktower Inn in Montana’s largest city, Billings, where his mother, Bobbi Clinch, lives.
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Clincher said Friday the hotel’s owner told her the job was still available for Beach, and she expects he will resume working there soon. “It really has”, Clincher said.
