An Andalusia man who is serving a life sentence for murder in the deaths of three people in Brooklyn in 1996 was denied parole Tuesday.

Ethan Eugene Dorsey, 49, formerly of Andalusia, was eligible for parole from an Alabama Department of Corrections facility, but the parole board denied his parole again.

Scott Williams, Richard Cary and 13-year-old Bryan Crane were brutally killed when Dorsey and Calvin Middleton planned a robbery at a country store in the Brooklyn community. Middleton is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole for his role in the triple murder.

In recent weeks, members of the Crane family sought letters to the Board of Pardons and Paroles opposing parole for Dorsey.

“Thank you to everyone who took the time to write a letter and sign a petition on our behalf to protest the parole of Bryan’s murderer,’ his aunt, Courtney Crane said on social media after yesterday’s hearing. “Thankfully, the Parole Board denied his parole. Unfortunately, we will go back in five years to fight it again. Again, thank you to everyone who helped us fight for justice for Bryan.”

“Every Nov. 20, the anniversary date of Bryan’s death, is a constant reminder of the night he was brutally murdered for no reason,” Crane said before the hearing. “Ethan Eugene Dorsey made the conscious decision to put a gun to the back of a 13-year-old boy’s head, less than three inches away, and pull the trigger. How someone can make this cold and heartless choice is something my family will never be able to fathom.”

Dorsey was sentenced to death in 1998, but the Alabama Supreme Court erased that in a 5-4 decision in 2003. The court ruled that Dorsey was found guilty of three counts of felony murder, and in a separate deliberation, guilty of robbery, which is a requirement for felony murder. The high court ruled that the convictions for felony murder meant Dorsey could not be sentenced under capital murder charges for the same crime, meaning he could not be given the death penalty.

 

He is currently serving his sentence at Staton Correctional Center in Elmore County.