West NY News

Senator George Borrello and Assemblyman Joseph Giglio criticized Governor Hochul’s Board of Parole following the escape of convicted murderer and rapist Edward Kindt from supervised transitional housing in Dutchess County. Kindt returned to Salamanca, violating both his parole and an order from the Seneca Nation banning him until at least 2025. This marks the second parole violation since his release.

Senator Borrello condemned the Division of Parole for delaying notification to the Cattaraugus County Sheriff’s Office by six days, putting the community at risk. Kindt was taken into custody early this morning.

“We are outraged that our community was put at risk by the Division of Parole’s failure to notify authorities in Cattaraugus County that Edward Kindt had escaped until six long days had passed,” said Senator Borrello. “With his record as a vicious predator and murderer and disciplinary violations while in prison, this individual should have never seen the light of day again. The very least that DOCCS could do to ensure public safety is to make sure his transitional supervision was as tightly controlled as possible. They failed to do that and there should be an inquiry as to why.”

Borrello further criticized the policies of Governor Hochul's administration, stating, “The pro-criminal policies of the Hochul administration and the Democratic majorities continue to put New Yorkers at risk. They destroyed public safety at every touch point in the criminal justice system... Every New Yorker should be concerned and outraged at the danger created by irresponsible Democratic policies.”

Assemblyman Giglio echoed these sentiments: "This is completely unacceptable and further proof that granting killers like Kindt parole doesn’t work. Parole knew Kindt wasn’t at his group home last Thursday, but it took them almost a week to notify the Cattaraugus County Sheriff’s Department. They put our community at risk."

Giglio criticized DOCCS for blaming a Microsoft outage for their delayed response: "DOCCS is trying to blame the delay in notification on last week’s Microsoft outage. Well, the phone lines weren’t down. They should have called the sheriff’s department."

Kindt was released from prison in March 2023 after serving time for raping and murdering Penny Brown, a nurse from Salamanca.