We have previously noted how the Lexington Herald-Leader hid the available mugshot of accused murderer Brandon Dockery, even when he was on the loose and considered to be “armed and dangerous.” Mr Dockery was a previously convicted felon — that’s how the Lexington Police Department had a mugshot of him in the first place — and the Herald-Leader has not been at all afraid to post the photos of convicted felons, even after the implementation of the McClatchy Mugshot Policy, at least not as long as the accused criminals or convicted felons were white.

Robert Stacy McCain noted that it took a name like Leif Halvorsen to get the newspaper to publish his mugshot! 🙂

The Herald-Leader’s Karla Ward did some actual journalism in ferreting out Mr Dockery’s name, after police did not release it during the Kentucky State Police’s investigation of the officer-involved shooting which led to Mr Dockery’s capture, so the paper has to be congratulated for that. And now, reporter Jeremy Chisenhall has done so more investigative work, for which he deserves credit. Hey, I’ve criticized the journolism^[1]The spelling ‘journolist’ comes from JournoList, an email list of 400 influential and politically liberal journalists, the exposure of which called into question their objectivity. I use the term … Continue reading of the paper often enough that it behooves me to give credit when credit is due!

Lexington homicide suspect was on parole after setting an apartment building ablaze

By Jeremy Chisenhall | August 4, 2021 4:34 PM

A Lexington man sentenced in 2012 to 45 years in state prison has been charged in a homicide that occurred earlier this year, not long after he was released on parole, according to court records.

Brandon Dockery, 32, was sentenced in 2012 to 45 years in prison after he admitted to lighting a Lexington apartment building on fire. The fire was set after he got into a fight with people in one of the apartments. He destroyed several apartments, killed pets and forced residents to flee the building. One jumped off a third-floor balcony.

Now Dockery has been charged with murder in a 2021 shooting after getting into a standoff with law enforcement that ended with him being shot, according to police and court records. He pleaded not guilty to the homicide, which happened about eight months after Dockery was released on parole.

Now I would add my usual “There’s more at the original” blurb, but, Alas! you cannot access it unless you are a Herald-Leader subscriber! Briefly, Mr Chisenhall’s article describes how Mr Dockery had his sexual advances toward a woman in an apartment building rebuffed, and was thrown out by her two brothers after he became aggressive; Mr Dockery, they stated, appeared to be intoxicated. Mr Dockery then threatened to kill them and burn down their building. He later returned with 95¢ worth of gasoline in a can, and set the building alight. An overhead photo in the Herald-Leader story shows the building as completely destroyed. Though Mr Dockery wrote a whining letter to Judge Pamela Goodwine, telling her that he had gone nuts temporarily insane when he torched the building, she was apparently unmoved, and sentenced him to 45 years in the state penitentiary.

And this is where things went bad. In the Bluegrass State, a felon becomes eligible for parole after serving only 20% of his sentence.

Mr Dockery, who should have been locked up until November 19, 2055, was turned loose after serving just 10 years, 8 months. He was, according to the Herald-Leader, released on October 23, 2020, which was a week before his parole eligibility date, as stated in the parole information I screen captured.

I will ask the question I have been asking all along: why shouldn’t the state Parole Board, which released Mr Dockery after serving just 23.7% of his sentence, be held accountable for Mr Dockery’s (alleged) murder of 30-year-old Raymar Webb? If the Parole Board had the option of keeping Mr Dockery locked up — an option they exercised following his first parole hearing — they should have done so. Because they did not, and if Mr Dockery really is Mr Webb’s killer, the Parole Board is in part responsible for Mr Webb being dead, stone-cold graveyard dead. If Mr Dockery is the actual killer, then Mr Webb would (probably) still be alive, if only the Parole Board had kept the accused behind bars, where he belonged.