Parole Board grants early prison release to Ashley Summers, 15 at the time of Redmond woman’s brutal killing

(Update: Board grants parole, June 30 release date)

'I’ve done everything in my power to be a better person.'

BEND, Ore. (KTVZ) – A 37-year-old woman who at 15 was the youngest of the “Redmond 5” teens convicted for their roles in the brutal March 2001 killing of Barbara Thomas at her home on the Old Bend-Redmond Highway was granted early release Friday by the Oregon Board of Parole.

Ashley Summers becomes the fourth of the five teens granted early release under terms of a commutation by Gov. Kate Brown, which in turn followed a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that said a life sentence for violent juvenile offenders violated the Constitution’s prohibition of “cruel and unusual” punishment.

After a four-hour hearing on Wednesday, the three-member parole board found that as specific in state statute, “that upon consideration of the age and immaturity of the AIC (adult in custody) at the time of the offense, and the behavior of the AIC thereafter, the AIC has demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation,” and set a parole release date of June 30.

She indicated at the hearing she plans to return to her father's and stepmother's home and seek work in a hair salon.

The five teens who became known as the Redmond 5 conspired to kill, then brutally beat and fatally shot resident Barbara Thomas when she came home from work.

“I know it won’t ease the pain, but I truly am sorry,” Summers, now 37, told the Oregon Board of Parole at the start of a four-hour hearing Wednesday morning. “I’m sorry to my family, my co-defendants’ family and the community for all the harm we have caused.”

“Not a day goes by that I don’t think of the pain and suffering Mrs. Thomas went through and that her murder caused,” she said. “I know that nothing I can do or say will ever make it right. The only thing I can do is take accountability for my role and do and be a better person.”

“I wish I could go back to that day,” Summers said. “I have a lot of guilt and shame that I wasn’t strong enough to stand up and do what was right. Maybe if I had been, I could have prevented Mrs. Thomas’s death.”

She later gave an example – that she could have gone out to Thomas’s car when she pulled into the driveway and told her she needed to leave. Just one alternate scenario she and all affected by the violent tragedy have had plenty of time to think about.

Summers, at 15 the youngest teen there that day, is the fourth to win release from prison, following recent Parole Board decisions regarding Justin Link, then 17, and Seth Koch, who also was then 15. Koch was the one who took the rifle from the hands of the woman’s 18-year-old son, Adam Thomas, who couldn’t pull the trigger – after they bashed her with wine bottles – and fired the fatal shot.

Lucretia Karle, 16 at the time, also was sentenced to 25 years and was released in the fall of 2021, all a result of a Supreme Court ruling about juvenile violent offenders and a later commutation order by Gov. Kate Brown. Thomas – sentenced as an adult – must wait until 2026 to request release from prison.

Twenty years ago, in an interview with this reporter (then with Bend.com/the Bend Bugle), Summers said she didn't think she deserved a 25-year jail term, "because I know that if I got out, I would never hurt anybody again. I would do good. I would never break the law. I would be a model citizen, pretty much. Because I know now that's what I should have been before."

Two decades later, Wednesday’s hearing was full of positive details about what Summers has done with her life at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Wilsonville since “aging out” of the Oregon Youth Authority facilities she was in previously -- from helping train and socialize dogs to being a hospice volunteer for three years, then earning her cosmetology degree and working in the prison salon, even taking customer service calls in a contract the state has with agencies such as the California DMV, talking about troubles with driver’s licenses and the like.

Both a cellmate and Summers’ father talked of how she’d matured since leaving the OYA and entering the prison. “She talks less about herself” than she used to, James Summers said.

Also different than the others ordered released, whose agreed-to plans reportedly involved leaving the area: Ashley Summers plans to move back home, to live with her father and stepmother, at least to start. There’s a room waiting, as well as a 4-year-old dog in need of some training “to calm him down a little bit,” her father said. Getting a driver’s license, going for groceries, doing housework, earning a paycheck -- things so many take for granted by that age.

“If she’s recognized in the community, that’s going to be an issue,” James Summers said, breaking into tears. “I’m hoping people give her a chance, and see that she has changed, and that she can become a productive citizen, a productive person.”

The hearing went through her life story, including her being grounded for a month for being caught drinking and bristling as rules, as did the other teens -- rules that she now says “were not as strict as we felt. We all felt like outcasts, not wanting to be in that area, around those trying to control us, mean to us.” She says she knows better now, that they only wanted the best for her.

“I don’t remember hearing the gunshot,” she said. “I’m sure I had to. I know blood is red, but I picture that all in black and white.”

It was, as repeated so many times in courtrooms and news reports, a plot to kill her, to get the woman’s car, to escape to Canada. She admits taking part in the conversation – about things like tying her up and putting her in the bathtub, electrocuting her.

She covered her ears, and Seth pulled the trigger. “Lucretia and I jumped up and ran outside.” Justin told them to start moving things to her car. They made it to the border and got caught.

“I know I’m not the person I was back then. I’ve done everything in my power to be a better person.”

Barbara Thomas’s niece, Sara Jones, testified at Seth’s and Justin’s parole hearings. Not this time. One can only imagine how hard it is for the family that the return of this infamous crime to people’s attention and the headlines is reopening old wounds, as if they could ever fully close.

Summers says she has about $3,000 saved and has been talking with a hair stylist business she could go to work for. But she also knows she could have trouble with anger, anxiety, crowds. Still, no disciplinary actions taken during over 20 years in OYA or prison speak to efforts to follow the rules and not go astray again.

She also knows “it’s going to be hard to make new friends” after all those years locked up, and is anxious about starting over. Especially back home.

“I’m more worried about what it’s going to bring up for Barbara’s family,” she said. “I don’t want stuff in their face all the time. I never want them to have to run into me. If they do, I’m never going to approach them. If they approach me, say their piece, I deserve whatever they have to say, and I’ll take it. I did a lot of damage. I know I’ve worked a lot on myself.”

A parole board ember raised concerns about Summers not completely ruling out ever having alcohol again. She noted how an evaluator pointed out that some of her behaviors as a teen – skipping school, drinking, smoking pot and cigarettes – put her at risk for more serious behavioral problem. And that she recognized how alcohol and marijuana contributed to the destructive “group think” that day.

“Why do you ever think it would be a good idea, returning to alcohol or drug use?” John Bailey asked, noting how so many he’s encountered had one drink, then another, and when something bad happens…

“I really want you to challenge yourself, ask the question: Is it really a good idea for me to ever drink again, given the harm that I participated in? That is my challenge to you.” She said she understood.

Darryl Nakahira, who prosecuted the case in 2001 as chief deputy district attorney, said while the DA’s office believes she should be held to the 25 years she promised to serve, he had some positive remarks as well.

Nakahira noted Summers had said that while her release might be a challenge for her, it will be 10 times harder for Thomas’s family. He noted that neither Link nor Koch made any statements mentioning Thomas’s family by name, and said it was “strikingly different” that she expressed “genuine remorse for what she did.”

Members of the Oregon Board of Parole also expressed positive reactions to what Summers has said and done over the years, and what others had to say on her behalf.