15-year minimum for murder

The Utah Sentencing Commission, after hearing a plea from the father of Lori Hacking, voted Wednesday to recommend increasing Utah's minimum mandatory sentence for murder from five years to 15.

Eraldo Soares, the father of murder victim Lori Hacking, pleaded with commission members to save future victim families from going through the shock that his did when he heard that his daughter's former husband and killer, Mark Hacking, could possibly be paroled as early as in his sixth year. However ,the parole board made it clear that it would be 30 years before Hacking would even get a parole hearing.

"I thought it was horrible," Soares said. "I felt it was insulting."

The news of the possibility, Soares said, pushed him into action, lobbying members of the Legislature and Utah Board of Pardons and Parole to have the law changed.

With the thousands of people who came to help search for his daughter, Soares said he felt he owed a debt to the people of Utah to give them peace of mind.

Members of the commission said public peace of mind was the major reason for their recommendation to raise the minimum mandatory to 15 years for murder.

Paul Boyden, executive director of the Statewide Association of Prosecutors, said the Utah Sentencing Commission received e-mails from people from all over the country, outraged at the news of a six-year mandatory sentence for Hacking.

Boyden said there is no real possibility that Hacking would be released by the Board of Pardons. But due to the public's lack of knowledge of how the system works, it appeared that way.

Boyden also explained that going above 15 years would raise other complications and could discourage murder suspects from accepting plea deals, which often spares victim families from going through the pains of a trial.

Soares said he wanted to seek a 30-year mandatory minimum but decided to agree to 15 after hearing Boyden's concerns.

One commission member voted against recommending the 15-year minimum mandatory sentence. John Hill, director for the Salt Lake Legal Defenders Association, said outside the meeting that he voted against it because he felt the penalty was too high and took away too much discretion from the Board of Pardons to weigh circumstances on a case-by-case basis.

"My vote had nothing to do with Hacking" Hill said, but added that the worst crimes, such as Hacking, should not define lesser cases. Hill said had the board recommended 10 years instead, he would have voted for it.