The grown children of a Greenwood mother who was brutally killed by a man who was 17 at the time say they are aggrieved that their mother’s convicted killer could possibly be released on parole.
“I don’t think it’s fair. It’s not fair to me, my sister, my brother, my kids,” said Felicia Turntine Johnson, one of Mary Turntine’s daughters.
Blue
Turntine, a 34-year-old mother and housekeeper at Travel Inn, was beaten to death by David Blue with a baseball bat in an alley in Greenwood the night of June 6, 1992. He also robbed and sexually assaulted her.
Blue was sentenced to death for capital murder after his conviction in 1993.
He later benefited, however, from two U.S. Supreme Court decisions.
One ruling in 2002 took him off death row after the court found executing intellectually disabled persons, such as Blue, violated the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment.
He was resentenced in 2003 to life without parole.
Then, a ruling in 2012 opened up the possibility that he could be released from prison since the nation’s highest court found that mandatory life sentences without parole for juveniles also violated the Eighth Amendment. This caused the trial court to reexamine Blue’s case.
In 2019 in Leflore County Circuit Court, Judge Richard Smith ordered that Blue undergo a mental evaluation to help a jury determine whether he was eligible for life with or without parole.
On Thursday, the Mississippi Supreme Court ruled that the evaluation was not needed because the only proper sentence a trial court could apply to Blue’s case was life in prison with the possibility of parole.
That does not sit right with Turntine’s three children, who are now all in their 40s and living in Texas. They ranged in age from 11 to 15 when their mother was killed.
“We deserve justice. When they went to life without parole, we were OK with that,” daughter Jennifer Turntine said. But, she noted, “My mother would never get her life back.”
Steven Pickett, the chair of the five-member Mississippi Parole Board, said by email Friday, “If the court rules (Blue) eligible, the board has one year in which to review the case. Programs successfully completed, lack of rule violations, victim opposition, community input from sheriffs, judges and district attorneys and psychiatric evaluation are all tools the board uses in making decisions.”
Given a chance to speak to the parole board, another daughter, Felicia Turntine Johnson, said she would tell its members, “He should sit in prison for the rest of his life and do his turn.”
She added, “Why can’t my momma just rest? He did the crime, so he needs to get through doing his turn.”
“It’s not right,” said Turntine’s sole son, John Turntine Jr. “We went years and years without memories of our mom, and to think he has the opportunity to build memories and walk the streets again is heartbreaking.”
The son added, “Our mom isn’t here, but we’re still being affected by this man’s action. I hope he rots in prison.”
Now 45, Blue is being held at the East Mississippi Correctional Facility in Lauderdale County.
Turntine’s grave marker rests outside Pillow Chapel Missionary Baptist Church, located on the western edge of Greenwood close to the intersection of U.S. 82 West and U.S. 49 South. Next to Turntine’s grave marker are bouquets of flowers and an outline of an angel.
• Contact Gerard Edic at 581-7239 or gedic@gwcommonwealth.com.
