Pocono News Section

I-Team Curley Family Wants to be Heard

I-Team Curley Family Wants to be Heard - Thursday, February 21, 2008 at 6:06PM EST

Thursday, Feb 21, 2008 @06:06pm EST
WILKES-BARRE, LUZERNE COUNTY-It's a case that gained national attention.. A wife poisons her husband and kills him. Now -- she wants to be released from prison. And the victim's family says their voices are not being heard

It's the case of Bob Curley of Wilkes-Barre, his wife admitted to killing him in 1991, by spiking his iced tea, with rat poison. now she wants out of prison. Bob Curley”s family says, another injustice is now taking place. Bob Curley had everything to live for a young, energetic man, a top notch electrician with a beautiful daughter and Joann, a loving wife, so he thought, she was not so loving-, prosecutors say "evil to the core". She put rat poison in his iced tea. She pleads guilty five years after he died. She was sentenced from 10 to 20 years. She is up for parole. She has a hearing next month.

Susan Hooper is Bob Curley's sister they are not allowed to testify against Curley.

"Now, we are not allowed to go, unfortunately we don’t have the right as victims, victim survivors, it seems like the defendant has more rights than we do!"

Victim’s families can send written testimony even videotapes, but for them, that is not enough.

"We have no right to go to Harrisburg and stand before parole board” says Hooper,
“So we can tell the parole board all about Bobby, what kind of person he was, we wonder what he would be like today, they can go see the person in prison."

Hooper is contacting local lawmakers, to try to change all of that...Not just for her family, but for those who may one day suffer the same kind of loss, the same kind of pain.
Susan Hooper doesn't deny the fact that Curley has the right to file for parole. She has served her minimum of 10 years, but she argues that victim’s families should still have the chance to speak out, and voice their opinion.