ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – When 80-year-old Theodore Bacino moved into a gated townhome community in July, neighbors assumed he was just another retiree who relocated here from Illinois to enjoy the Central Florida sunshine.
“I see him out all the time but I don’t know anything about him,” said Linnette Dowdell, who lives a few doors down from the new arrival.
“He looks pretty harmless.”
Dowdell and other neighbors were unaware the elderly man with large holes in his tennis shoes had just been released on parole after spending decades in prison.
His crime: murder of a police officer.
His sentence: 75 to 100 years in prison.
“I was escaping after a robbery that day. And that's how a good man, Michael Mayborne, lost his life,” Bacino told News 6.
Bacino is among 175 former inmates convicted of first-degree murder or attempted murder who are currently serving parole in Florida, records show.
Most of those parolees are senior citizens like Bacino, 80, who were convicted of crimes in the 1960s, '70s and '80s, prior to significant changes in sentencing laws.
Many live in family-oriented communities like the one where Bacino now resides.
“I'm free to come and go as I want.
I can go anywhere in Orange County that I want to,” Bacino said.
“I’ve been living good.”
Bank robbery leads to murder
In March 1975, Bacino and an accomplice robbed the Poplar Grove State Bank just outside Rockford, Illinois.
Bacino kidnapped the bank manager but later let him go as he drove away from the crime scene, records show.
While on the run from law enforcement, Bacino hid out in a barbershop, holding the barber and customers at gunpoint, authorities said.
As deputies closed in, the 28-year-old tried to escape down an alley.
“I remember one man coming after me.
He crawled over a fence dressed in blue jeans,” said Bacino.
“I could hear him say ‘Drop it!
Drop it! Drop it!’
I don’t know how many times he gave me the chance to drop that pistol.”
That man was Winnebago County detective Michael Mayborne, a 28-year-old married father of two.
“We wrestled.
And unfortunately I got the best of him.
He shot me once and I shot him three times,” Bacino told News 6.
“The outcome was he died.
And I’m still here.”
It took jurors less than an hour to convict Bacino of murder.
A judge later sentenced him to prison for 75 to 100 years.
Sentencing laws changed
When Bacino was incarcerated in 1974, many states including Illinois and Florida allowed inmates to earn time off their sentence for good behavior.
Convicted murderers could also ask a state parole board to release them early as an act of mercy.
As crime rates skyrocketed across the country, lawmakers began to question whether inmates were able to be rehabilitated while on parole.
By the mid-1990s, Florida and many other states had abolished parole while adopting new “truth in sentencing” laws that required defendants convicted of murder to serve their entire court-imposed sentences.
Today, defendants convicted of first-degree murder in Florida face the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole.
In Illinois, the mandatory minimum sentence for that crime is 20-60 years, with life imprisonment possible depending on the circumstances of the murder.
However, inmates still serving prison time before the laws were changed can petition state parole boards to release them.
In some cases, inmates may not be required to serve all of the time initially imposed by the court.
Although a judge sentenced Bacino to more than 75 years in prison, under Illinois’s 1974 sentencing guidelines he was eligible for release after 51 years.
Bacino was also entitled to erase another 10 years off his sentence for good behavior, records show.
For years, Mayborne’s daughter fought to keep her dad’s killer locked up in prison.
“We knew he was going to be released. We've all dealt with it in our own ways.
Physically, emotionally, mentally,” Jennifer Sutkay told WIRF-TV in Rockford.
“It is definitely like living a childhood nightmare to think I could run into him on the streets one day.”
Before Bacino was released from prison, the State of Illinois ordered that he be placed on supervised parole for a 3-year period.
Bacino chose to serve that parole in Central Florida.
Parolees supervised by Florida Dept. of Corrections
“I don’t pay no rent.
They let me live here free,” Bacino told News 6 as he sat inside the garage of his daughter’s townhome where he resides alone.
“I got a Social Security check coming in every month. $1542.”
Under the rules of an interstate compact, the Florida Department of Corrections was required to accept and supervise Bacino as long as he meets the conditions of release set by Illinois authorities.
As part of those conditions, Bacino must undergo anger management counseling and have regular visits with his parole officer.
He is also required wear an ankle bracelet monitor.
“If I leave the house, go anywhere, this has to be in my pocket,” said Bacino as he showed off the GPS transmitter.
“They know where I’m at 24-7.”
Under the rules of his parole, Bacino cannot possess a firearm or other dangerous weapon.
And he cannot violate any criminal statutes.
If Bacino breaks any laws during his parole, he could potentially be sent back to prison.
Or he might be given another chance.
Paroled murderer repeatedly arrested
Charles LoBosco had only been living in the United States a few months in 1979 when the 18-year-old German immigrant got into a dispute with a drug dealer in Atlanta, court records show.
According to LoBosco’s confession, he stabbed the drug dealer to death while another man held him.
The two later burned the victim’s body, witnesses told police.
A judge sentenced LoBosco to life in prison for the murder.
However, in 2004 the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles allowed LoBosco to leave prison on parole and move to Central Florida.
Most recently, he lived in a small home in New Smyrna Beach across the street from Joe Brouillette.
“I had no idea,” said Brouillette when told about LoBosco’s past.
“Holy moley!
No, not at all.”
For nearly a decade, LoBosco managed to avoid trouble with law enforcement, records show.
That changed in 2013, when police arrested the parolee for illegally possessing pain pills without a prescription.
LoBosco later pleaded no contest to possessing drug paraphernalia, a misdemeanor, and was sentenced to the 313 days he had served in jail waiting for his criminal case to be resolved.
Since LoBosco was not convicted of a violent crime, Georgia authorities were not required to seek a parole violation warrant, records indicate.
In July 2016, police arrested LoBosco a second time for allegedly shoplifting cat food, nail clippers, and batteries from a Daytona Beach Publix.
Once again, LoBosco pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor.
A judge sentenced him to six months of probation and ordered him to complete a residential treatment program.
The convicted murderer was allowed to remain on parole in New Smyrna Beach.
About two months later, LoBosco was back in the Volusia County jail for a third time on a charge of possessing drug paraphernalia.
According to police, LoBosco tried to dispose of a plastic bag containing methamphetamine residue.
Prosecutors also charged LoBosco with violating his probation from his previous shoplifting case.
Under the interstate compact rules, if a parolee commits three or more significant violations that establish a pattern of non-compliance of the conditions of supervision, the state where parole was granted must issue a warrant to retake the offender.
Following LoBosco’s most recent arrest, authorities in Georgia obtained a warrant.
He is now in the process of being extradited back to Atlanta where a judge will determine whether his parole should be revoked and his life prison sentence reinstated.
Bacino insists he will stay out of trouble.
“I'm a born again, spirit filled Christian,” said Bacino.
“I belong to Jesus Christ and I'm washed in the blood of the lamb. As far as anything else goes, it’s not really important.”