By Kim Bell
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
ST. LOUIS — The secret workings of the Missouri Parole Board have outraged the families of Harry Little Sr.'s victims, who want to know why the double murderer was freed from prison and is now accused of killing again.
“Someone’s killed twice and they knew it and they let him out?” asked a tearful Martez Brown, whose mother, Syliva Brown, was stabbed and then fatally shot last week in St. Louis. Police say Little confessed to the crime. “I just don’t understand. You just can’t keep killing people.”
“Here’s another family devastated by this man’s madness,” Martez Brown added.
Little, 63, charged with Brown’s slaying, spent about 17 years in a Missouri prison for killing two people months apart in 1977. One was his estranged wife, Sharon Little, whom he shot. The other was a friend, Hargrove Bunting, killed with a car jack seven months later while Little was out on bail.
Sharon Little’s sisters were shocked this week to see that Harry Little — sentenced in 1978 to life in prison plus 30 years — was charged with another slaying.
“I really thought when you say ‘life,’ that means you never, ever get out,” said Gloria Roberts, of Belleville. “That’s what I thought.”
At the time of Little’s convictions in St. Louis city and St. Louis County, people sentenced to a life sentence or any term in excess of 50 years were eligible for parole after serving 12 years, according to David Owen, spokesman for the Missouri Department of Corrections.
The reason Little was paroled after serving about 17 years remains secret. The hearings, votes and records of the Missouri Parole Board are closed to the public. Owen declined to make anyone from the Parole Board available for an interview to discuss why Little was paroled.
His first victim in 1977, Sharon Little, was one of 10 siblings. The oldest is Lucinda Turner, 74, of Belleville, who called the Post-Dispatch after seeing Little’s photo and hearing news of his arrest for killing Sylvia Brown.
“I just felt if they hadn’t let him out, maybe that lady would still be alive,” Turner said. “It’s just unbelievable. I don’t know how he could have been out. I’m just flabbergasted.”
Sharon Little’s sisters say they don’t know the latest victim, but they are hoping to contact her son to let him know how sorry they are about her death. Martez Brown said Thursday that he would be happy to hear from them.
“We need to all get together and make sure justice is served,” he said. “This man really needs to pay. I really hope the system works this time. It’s happening again and again, and it’s sickening.”
Martez Brown, 37, said he was unaware of Harry Little’s violent past. He said Little and his mother had been in a long-term relationship and lived at a home in the 4100 block of California Avenue, in St. Louis’ Dutchtown neighborhood.
Neighbors told police they heard a woman’s screams, followed by gunshots, on the night of Nov. 13. Police said in court papers that she had been attacked in the kitchen, stabbed, then shot to death as she lay in the backyard sometime between 8 and 9 p.m. that night. Police say Little called police dispatchers the next day to report Brown, 59, had been shot. Brown’s body was found in the backyard at 6:42 a.m. Nov. 14.
St. Louis police have refused to explain to the Post-Dispatch the timeline of events, or say if police went to the home on California and into the backyard after witnesses reported hearing those noises. Police referred questions to the circuit attorney, who declined to elaborate beyond what is in the public court file. A man who lives on Oregon Avenue told the Post-Dispatch that he and his wife called police when they heard the gunshots. They saw a police car driving down the alley, but he didn’t know if the officer stopped to take a look in any backyards.
Harry Little was being held Thursday without bail in the St. Louis City Jail on the latest charge of first-degree murder.
“My mother was a beautiful woman who gave her happiness for others’ happiness,” Martez Brown said. “She didn’t deserve that kind of torture, that kind of treatment. No one does.”
Most of all, Martez Brown is sickened by what police say Little did to his mother. “He snatched half of me,” Martez Brown said. “He took my world.”
Sylvia Brown was an outspoken woman who loved dancing and directed the church choir when she was younger, Martez Brown said. “She was the life of the party,” her son said. Recently, she was on disability and used a cane to walk.
Visitation for Sylvia Brown will be from 4 to 7 p.m. Friday at Granberry Mortuary, 8806 Jennings Station Road in Jennings. The funeral is scheduled for 6 p.m. Saturday at the mortuary. A Sylvia Brown Memorial Fund has been set up at U.S. Bank to help pay for funeral expenses.
On May 7, 1977, Little walked into the University City police station and announced, “I shot my wife,” the Post-Dispatch reported the next day. Authorities found Sharon Little, 26, dead in her apartment at 825 Leland Avenue in University City. The Littles had been separated and were trying to get back together. Harry Little, who was 25 at the time, showed police where he had hidden the murder weapon. Sharon Little was shot in the head, chest and back. He told police his wife had grabbed a loaded .22-caliber pistol from a drawer, they wrestled and he shot her. According to the newspaper article, Little told police he had tried to shoot himself but the pistol came apart.
Sharon and Harry Little had one son, who was 11 months old at the time of her death. Sharon’s sister, Shirley D. Minter-Smith in North Carolina, said Sharon Little had left Harry Little because he was abusive, then she went to talk with him to arrange visits for him to see their son. It was on that day that he fired five shots at her, including in the back of the head, Shirley Smith said.
The next month, Little posted $10,000 bail and was released from jail to await trial. In December 1977, he was charged with fatally beating Bunting, 25, with a car jack after a quarrel in front of Bunting’s home in the 5800 block of Nina Place. Little contended he thought Bunting was armed.
Little was convicted in St. Louis County of second-degree murder in his wife’s killing and sentenced to life in prison. He was also convicted in St. Louis city of second-degree murder in Bunting’s death. The city jurors recommended he serve 30 years in prison.
Owen, the spokesman for the Missouri Department of Corrections, said Little was credited for 320 days spent in jail awaiting trial and spent about 17 years in prison, from October 1978 to June 1995. He went back to prison in August 2000 for a parole violation stemming from a stealing charge in Richmond Heights. It dealt with the theft of 47 articles of clothing from a department store. In arguing for the judge to go easy on Little after the stealing charge, Sylvia Brown was among a half dozen people who wrote letters in support of Little. He was paroled most recently in August 2002.
Minter-Smith, a former employee of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, said no one from Missouri’s Parole Board or the Department of Corrections ever notified her or her siblings that Little was being considered for early release. She said she found out later, once he was freed, after talking to her nephew, the son of Sharon and Harry Little.
St. Louis Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce was critical earlier this week of the Missouri Parole Board’s decision to release a double-murderer after only 17 years.
“This is a decision by a parole board, and I don’t understand parole board math,” the prosecutor said. “Obviously, we thought his punishment was life plus 30 (years).”
Joyce said cases like his are the prime reason the Missouri Legislature enacted truth-in-sentencing laws in the 1990s, requiring someone to serve 85 percent of a sentence for violent crimes. A life sentence in Missouri now would be 30 years, and someone would have to serve about 25 years before being eligible for parole. Joyce said her office is discussing the discussing the possibility of seeking the death sentence against Little.