Florida Court Rules State Does Not Need to Correct Miscalculation of Crosley Green’s Parole Date That Could Cost Him 40 Years of His Life

Tallahassee, Fla. – August 7, 2024: A Florida court ruled last week that the Florida Commission on Offender Review does not have to reset Crosley Green’s eligible parole date or correct a miscalculation that arbitrarily added more than 40 years to his imprisonment. The Circuit Court for Florida’s 2^ndJudicial Circuit denied Mr. Green’s writ of mandamus seeking to compel the Commission to correct a 2015 error that set his presumptive parole release date (PPRD) to 2054, when he is 97 years old, or to calculate a new PPRD in accordance with Florida law. Under Florida law, Mr. Green should be eligible for parole now.

The PPRD is the date on which an inmate is presumed to be eligible for parole. In 2023, Mr. Green requested the Commission correct its 2015 miscalculation, or alternatively to set a new PPRD because Mr. Green had been ordered released from prison by a federal court and then returned when that order was overturned on appeal. The Commission refused, and the Court’s decision upholds that refusal on procedural grounds. The Commission did not deny, and the Court’s decision did not address, that the Commission had miscalculated Mr. Green’s PPRD and continued to apply the incorrect PPRD despite his release from and reentry into incarceration.

“We are deeply disappointed by the court’s decision. It is wrong on the law and the facts, and we will appeal,” said Crowell & Moring partner Keith J. Harrison, who leads the pro bono legal team that has defended Mr. Green’s innocence since 2008.   

The 66-year-old grandfather has already served more than three decades in prison, including 19 years on death row, while maintaining his innocence in a 1989 Titusville, Fla. murder. In 2021, Mr. Green was set free on conditional release after a federal court ruled that he was wrongfully convicted after finding that Brevard County prosecutors withheld evidence pointing to his innocence. During his two years of freedom, Mr. Green reunited with his family, got engaged, and held full-time employment. But the ruling was overturned, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case. Mr. Green was ordered to return to prison in 2023.

At two Commission hearings in 2023, Mr. Green’s lawyers argued that the Commission miscalculated the PPRD and that Mr. Green has a right under Florida law for proper consideration of parole. In November, Commission Chairman Melinda Coonrod agreed and voted to grant the full relief Mr. Green requested. However, two other members of the three-person panel voted to “take no action.”

The Commission has sole discretion to correct the miscalculation any time it wishes to do so.

For more information about the case, visit the Crosley Green information page.

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