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RENO, Nev. (AP) — A Reno man sentenced to 28 years for killing and dismembering seven dogs will have a hearing next week to determine if he can be eligible for parole for one of his convictions.
Jason Brown is set for a Dec. 31 parole hearing, Washoe County Deputy District Attorney Derek Dreiling said. Brown was sentenced in October to up to 4 years each for seven counts and was ordered to serve them consecutively. But he is eligible for parole after serving 19 to 48 months for every count.
Next month's hearing is only for his first count. If he was granted parole, he would have to face another hearing for the second count.
"There's a strong likelihood the parole hearing won't even happen," Dreiling said. "Right around the time of his offenses, the laws on how you look at parole changed."
Nevada lawmakers approved legislation in 2013 that changed some provisions involving sentencing of certain criminals and parole eligibility for certain prisoners. According to the law, sentences must be aggregated unless they are life without the possibility of parole or death.
Prosecutors have filed a motion to aggregate Brown's sentences before he could be paroled, the Reno Gazette-Journal reported (http://on.rgj.com/1JAJ3kj) . If a judge decides to grant it, Brown would serve a minimum of a little over 11 years. But the fact Brown committed the crimes before and after the law went into effect in July 2014 complicates matters, Dreiling said.
"I filed a motion for this case to be interpreted under the new sentence, and the defense is not opposing that motion," Dreiling said.
Defense attorney John Oakes could not be reached for comment Saturday.
If the judge approves the motion, Brown's parole hearing will be discontinued.
Brown, a former presidential scholar and psychology major, had said he pleaded no contest to seven counts because he was a drug addict and had no recollection of the events.
The adopted son of a wealthy Reno couple who excelled academically and athletically at Reno High School, Brown was arrested in July 2014 after police came upon a gruesome, bloody crime scene where they found four dog heads inside a mini-refrigerator at a Reno motel room where he had been staying.
Oakes, had urged the judge to order him to treatment for chronic depression and a long history of drug abuse that one psychiatrist described as the worst case of drug addiction she had ever seen.
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Information from: Reno Gazette-Journal, http://www.rgj.com
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