PITTSFIELD, Mass. — A city man serving a life sentence for killing his 2-year-old son 43 years ago has been granted parole. 

 

According to the Boston Globe, the Parole Board on Monday voted to release Richard N. Mayes Jr., 78, to a halfway house.

 

Mayes was charged with beating his son to death in 1983 when he wouldn't eat. The child, Lawrence Richon, had received blows to his head, body, arms and legs. Mayes also told police he'd hit his son four times with a plastic baseball bat. 

 

According to media reports at the time, Mayes tried to resuscitate Lawrence when he later collapsed and cried to police that he did it when arrested. 

 

The boy was taken by life flight to Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, where he died from blood clots in his head. 

 

Mayes was found guilty of second-degree murder by a Superior Court jury and sentenced to life in state prison.

 

According to the Globe, Mayes had been denied parole five times previously but told the board he had been sober for three decades and had not had a disciplinary report in a dozen years.