The Riverside City Council Tuesday unanimously approved the submission of a letter opposing parole for Joseph Neale Jr., currently held at Valley State Prison on a 374-year sentence.
On October 6, 1998, Neale entered a closed-door city hall meeting and shot several city leaders, wounding then-Mayor Ron Loveridge, four council members and two police officers after taking them hostage. He surrendered after being shot by police, and was later found guilty of 12 counts of premeditated attempted murder.
According to news reports from the time, Neale was angry about losing his part-time youth chess coaching job four years prior. That anger led him to carry out his attack, according to The Press-Enterprise and Los Angeles Times.
“What he did was an attack on our institution of government,” Councilmember Sean Mill said in an interview with The Riverside Record. “Though it didn’t happen to me personally, it might as well have happened to me, because if we have to worry about folks shooting up our council meetings, that’s a pretty sad state of affairs.”
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Mill worked with Councilmember Chuck Conder to push the letter forward at the February 3 meeting.
“Inmate’s behavior indicates a willingness to use extreme violence in pursuit of personal grievances,” the letter states. “Granting parole could expose the public to a significant likelihood of re-offense under similar stressors.”
Neale, who has a tentative parole date set for September 1, has waived his right to a parole board hearing three times over the past four years, according to California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) records. CDCR rules state a person may only voluntarily waive their right to a parole hearing three times in a row before a hearing is required.
In 2016, Neale sent a letter to The Press-Enterprise in which he expressed remorse and apologized for his actions, but those involved in the shooting told the newspaper they were skeptical about the sincerity of his letter.
“I can’t look into his heart to see if he’s truly sorry or not,” Mill told The Record. “I just know that my friend [former Councilmember] Chuck Beaty wakes up every day having to live with the ramifications of Mr. Neale’s actions that day.”
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How can community members also submit a letter?
Hi there, you can find more information about the Board of Parole hearings, including how to submit a comment, on CDCR’s website here. Thanks for reaching out!
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The Riverside Record