By AP/KWMU
Jefferson City, MO – When Lynda Branch walks out of prison today (Thursday), she will be the second Missouri woman in a week's time to be freed because the state Supreme Court felt they had served enough time for the deaths of their abusive husbands.
The women's lawyers and advocates for domestic violence victims say they don't know what lasting impact, if any, the release of Branch, and Shirley Lute last Friday, will have on other cases involving battered women convicted of killing their husbands.
But they say the women's releases show how much attitudes and laws concerning domestic violence have changed.
"I think it heralds the changes in our system toward abused women who commit crimes," said Mary Beck, a University of Missouri-Columbia law professor who served as Branch's attorney. "I did not think the women for which we were seeking clemency were treated justly by the courts. I think the mistreatment was that the courts did not admit evidence of abuse."
Branch, now 54, was convicted in 1986 before a law change that now allows evidence of abuse to be admitted in court. Lute, who is 76, went to prison in 1979.
"It's been a long, hard journey," Branch said by phone Wednesday from the Chillicothe prison. "I'm so grateful to those who've helped me. I just hope this opens doors (for other women with similar cases)."
Branch was convicted of shooting her husband in 1986 at their Cole County home. Lute was convicted of aiding her son in the 1978 Monroe County murder of her husband. Both were sentenced to life; Lute served nearly 30 years and Branch about 20.
"They served more time than anyone in a similar situation would now," said Colleen Coble, chief executive officer with the Missouri Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence, which worked to get the women released.
Coble said sentencing guidelines were different when Branch's and Lute's cases came through the system, and courts at the time didn't allow defendants in trials to detail their histories of being abused.
"That's why it's crucial to go back to the cases of these women," Coble said. "We're not asking for special allowances. It's the recognition of the level of violence against these women in their homes that has to be brought forward in these cases."
In 2000, the coalition and professors and students from the state's four law schools started a battered women's clemency movement, requesting clemency for 11 women. Of those, Branch and Lute were the only ones to have their sentences commuted.
Five others didn't get clemency but were paroled. Four remain in prison, but efforts to get them released continue.
Lute and Branch will be on parole for the rest of their lives. Branch said she wants to become a certified legal researcher so she can help others with their cases. She especially intends to reach out to abused women who end up in the prison system.
"That is my passion," she said. "Since I've had to deal with law for almost 21 years, I think I'm good at it."
She said she never doubted that she would be released someday. "Sometimes justice works and sometimes it fails," Branch said. "Things have changed in a lot of aspects. People are a little more understanding of domestic violence, but they still have a lot to learn.
"I really want something good to come from this. I don't have time to be bitter or angry. I just have time to start a new journey."
She said she will live with friends in Jefferson City for now. Her first four months will be spent under house arrest.
"I'm starting my life over from scratch," Branch said. "I have nothing, except what my family and friends have given me. I'm starting as if I were young again and I'm 54 years old."
Meanwhile, Lute is slowly trying to adjust to her new freedom.
"Being home is like learning how to walk again," said Lute, who was 47 when she got locked up. "After 29 years, everything is different. I'm trying to get organized."
She is signing up for Social Security benefits and plans to get a job. Her children, now all adults with kids of their own, are going to help her get a new driver's license.
Lute said she made numerous attempts to get released from prison, but began to feel she would never be free.
"I had legal papers running out of my ears," she said. "I kept filing and filing for appeals and different things I felt weren't right about my case. Nothing happened."
Then help came from the coalition and attorney Jane Aiken, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis.
After Gov. Bob Holden commuted Branch's and Lute's sentences in 2004, the state Board of Probation and Parole declined to release the women. But the coalition continued its efforts, and the Missouri Supreme Court earlier this year ordered Lute's release and the consideration of Branch's.
"Some people would call them hopeless cases, as they are not," Aiken said, "which we all now know."
Beck, the attorney for Branch, said the problem with the cases is that abused women know when their lives are at risk, but others outside the relationship don't recognize the threat.
"That makes it difficult for others to understand why women who are abused might kill their abuser when they do," Beck said.