It?s been almost 17 years since Roger L. Dow was sent to prison for murdering his 3-year-old foster daughter. He?s graduated from college since he went away, worked hard at his prison jobs. Now he wants to go home to his family.
A Baltimore County judge Tuesday afternoon shaved eight years off Dow?s 45-year prison sentence, exercising a right he had reserved nearly two decades earlier to modify the sentence he imposed.
Dow?s family members filled several benchesand smiled as he winked at them when he walked in the court.
Across the aisle sat Kathryn Kahler, who was Ashley Smith?s foster mother before the girl was handed over to Dow. About five months after he took her, Ashley was dead.
“She was brutally, physically abused,” said deputy State?s Attorney Steve Bailey, recounting details of the cuts, marks and healed wounds, which suggested she?d been hit with an object, that were found on Ashley?s body.
In the end, Ashley was suffocated, he said.
Dow told the court he was sorry he killed Ashley.
“For a while now, I?ve been painted as this monster with no regard for life,” he said. “I loved Ashley, too, very deeply.”
Judge Joseph Murphy said it was troubling that Dow hadn?t sooner taken full responsibility for the murder.
“The horrible death and the victim?s suffering is something I guess I will never forget,” Murphy said.
Noting that he approved of the right to modify sentences, Murphy said he would reduce his total time in prison to 37 years.
Even as Dow?s family members declined to comment, saying they would have talked if he?d been allowed to come home, Kahler said she was sorry his sentence was reduced.
“She was just so beautiful ? so beautiful, and so friendly, and so smart. And she sang. Didn?t she show off?” Kahler said of Ashley, turning to her son, Charles. “I thought she might grow up to be a singer.”
