Inmate who killed as a juvenile gets parole eligibility

BATON ROUGE, La. – A 71-year-old prisoner who was a juvenile when he killed a sheriff's deputy in 1963 will get parole consideration.

District Judge Richard D. Anderson resentenced Henry Montgomery in a Baton Rouge courtroom Wednesday.

Montgomery had appealed his life-without-parole sentence to the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court ruled in Montgomery's favor in January 2016, finding that the court's 2012 ruling against automatic juvenile life-without-parole sentences should be applied retroactively.

Because of the court's decision, the Louisiana Legislature this month changed the law to give some inmates who committed murder as teenagers a chance for parole after 25 years.

Montgomery fatally shot Deputy Charles Hurt in a Baton Rouge park in 1963. Anderson said Montgomery has been a "model prisoner" since then.