?Summer last?[he used] a statewide television hookup to pitch his case for parole abolition and sentence reform. He buttressed the broadcast with seven wrenching testimonials from people who had lost loved ones to violent crime.???There's was only one problem: It wasn't true? [The] plan for ending parole, had it been in place earlier, would have prevented just one of those crimes.? Virginian Pilot 9/6/95
Sound familiar?
It should?except this was 1995 and then Secretary of Public Safety Jerry Kilgore was helping George Allen press forward a stronger, tougher stance on inmates. As Secretary of Public Safety, Kilgore held the chief statewide office responsible for penal policies.
In this position, Jerry Kilgore established a solid record?for public deception, corruption and mismanagement. This particular incident highlighted that even more than ten years ago, Jerry Kilgore would never let the truth stand between him and his selfish political objectives.
According to the Virginian Pilot:
?But perhaps the most outrageous distortion was delivered by Public Safety Secretary Jerry Kilgore. He told the Richmond Times-Dispatch that if the Democrats do not want to spend money on more prisons, then they can tell voters ``which murderers, which rapists and armed robbers we're going to let back on the street because of lack of prison space.''??Mr. Kilgore knows - or should know - that this is a false choice. As of Aug. 18, there were 24,522 inmates in the state prison system. Of these, 11,858 - nearly half - were sentenced for nonviolent crimes.?
Even a decade ago, the public had to question Kilgore's accountibility:
?This last prevarication borders on the strange. It's one thing to reject the recommendations of your political opponents, but quite another to ignore your own.?
Indeed, Kilgore was a key member of Allen's Parole Abolition and Sentencing Reform Commission and had recommended sentencing alternatives.
The Virginian Pilot summed it up succinctly:
?With much at stake in the fall elections, and increasingly defensive over the effectiveness and cost of his correctional policies, the governor [Allen] and his staff [Kilgore] have plainly thrown veracity to the wind.?
It's a commentary that very well could apply to Kilgore's current campaign.
Today, Kilgore would like to blame the horrified public reaction to his current manipulatively dishonest advertisements on his media advisor, Scott Howell. But his record shows that Jerry Kilgore opportunistically twisted the truth and emotions in exactly the same way more than ten years ago!
When it came to lying to the public, Jerry Kilgore never changed. When it comes to being honest to voters, Jerry's own record show that he takes his commitment to heart: "never had, never will."