Kalispell child killer denied parole
A former Kalispell man who murdered his two children nearly three decades ago was denied Tuesday morning at the Montana State Prison in Deer Lodge.
According to the Montana Board of Pardons and Parole Chair Annette Carter, Richard “Gary” Sweet, 62, was denied by the board because of the gravity of the crimes he committed and the impact his release could have on the community.
“Those factors made us decide parole was not appropriate at this time,” Carter said. “He is still accountable to what he did and he expressed a lot of remorse for his actions.”
Carter said one person, who was not a relative, spoke in favor of his release. The board also received several letters opposing and supporting his release.
Sweet was convicted in 1994 of murdering his two children, 8-year-old Anna Leah Sweet, and 6-year-old Erik Samuel Sweet, on Friday, Sept. 8, 1993, in Lincoln County.
Previous Daily Inter Lake articles indicate Sweet married his then-wife Janice in April 1982. But marriage troubles arose for the couple. Sweet worked in Alaska and was only a part-time resident of Kalispell.
Sweet had picked up the children from Janice to go camping near the Fisher River in Lincoln County, according to then-Lincoln County Sheriff Ray Nixon. Sweet shot both children in the head twice with a .22-caliber rifle.
He then placed them in their dinosaur sleeping bags and inside his own sleeping bag and drove to a remote forested area about 6 miles south of Libby. There he buried his children in a shallow grave.
Sweet’s brother-in-law contacted the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office three days later after Sweet showed up at his Libby home and told him about killing the children and his plan to head to Kalispell, where Janice was living.
Lincoln County authorities called law enforcement agencies in Flathead County and Kalispell to alert them of Sweet possibly coming to the area.
Sweet was found near Kmart on Montana 35 in Kalispell and was arrested without incident.
“We were all afraid of what he was coming back here to do,” then-Flathead County Sheriff Jim DuPont said at the time.
A .41-caliber pistol and a bundled-up tent were confiscated from Sweet’s vehicle. A fisherman later found the murder weapon near the Sweet’s campsite.
The bodies of Anna and Erik were found that afternoon.
Sweet faced initial charges of deliberate homicide and was later convicted of two counts of mitigated deliberate homicide. Lincoln County District Judge Robert Keller sentenced Sweet to 40 years in Montana State Prison on Sept. 2, 1994.
Sweet was denied parole in January 2009 and April 2014.
After the 2014 hearing, Parole Board Chairman Mike McKee told the Inter Lake Sweet refused to answer questions about the crime and “that made pretty short work of the hearing.”
Carter said Sweet’s next hearing will be an administrative hearing in April 2024 to determine when his next parole hearing would be scheduled. She said it could be as soon as 2025 or as late as 2031.
Reporter Scott Shindledecker may be reached at 758-4441 or sshindledecker@dailyinterlake.com.
