VIDEO VAULT: Murdered Teen’s Mom Blasts Stony Brook Mascot

For most students, Wolfie the Seawolf is a smiling symbol of Stony Brook University, a mascot meant to cheer, celebrate and bring people together. But for Barbara Connelly, seeing Wolfie photographed alongside advocates seeking expanded parole opportunities for aging prisoners, including people convicted of murder and other violent crimes, brought back a pain she has carried for nearly half a century.

Her son, James “Jimmy” Francis Connelly, never had the opportunity to grow old. He was just 15 when he was brutally murdered in 1979, stabbed 22 times and his throat cut three times after being chased through a Long Island industrial park.

His killer was eventually sentenced to 20 years to life. Jimmy would be 63 today.

Connelly turned unimaginable grief into a lifetime of helping others. She is director of Parents and Other Survivors of Murdered Victims (POMV), a Long Island organization that has supported families devastated by homicide since 1981.

The group meets monthly, assists grieving families in Nassau and Suffolk counties and fights to ensure victims are not forgotten in debates over sentencing, parole and public safety.

POMV is now demanding answers from Stony Brook over Wolfie’s appearance alongside Release Aging People in Prison, or RAPP, advocates and New York State Senator Julia Salazar at a recent campus volunteer event.

The group says criminal justice reform can be debated, but the families of those murdered deserve a seat at the table, too.

Connelly spoke with South Shore Press Managing Editor Stefan Mychajliw about Wolfie, the son she still mourns 47 years later and the pain that never received a release date.

STEFAN MYCHAJLIW: What was your reaction when you saw Wolfie there?

BARBARA CONNELLY: Anger. I was angry.

Mascots are supposed to be the most loving little things, and people are so happy when they come out in the sports arenas. How do you have something so happy with the release of prisoners, aging prisoners?

There’s no happy mascot for us. The prisoners are going to get out early. Our victims do not get out early. They don’t ever get out. We never get rid of the pain and suffering.

MYCHAJLIW: What is your message to Stony Brook?

CONNELLY: Wolfie is supposed to be cheering people on: “Go, my team.” What team was Wolfie cheering for that day? RAPP is no sports team. To me, the whole thing was that Wolfie was there.

MYCHAJLIW: Why do victims’ families need a greater voice?

CONNELLY: The most important thing is that we have both sides heard from. There were no victims asked to attend or be part of that. Victims have a voice.

You can’t glamorize getting people out of jail early who committed the worst of crimes.

MYCHAJLIW: How close to home did this hit for you personally?

CONNELLY: I couldn’t stand the thought of anybody cheering when families have lost.

My son is gone now 47 years. He was 15. The 15 years that they talk about, they don’t talk about the 15-year-olds that are in graves.

He deserved to have those extra 15 years, the extra 30 years, the extra 47 years.

We all have a hole in us. And that hole doesn’t get filled. The grave gets filled, but the hole in us doesn’t.

We don’t get an out-of-jail card. We’re in jail constantly.

MYCHAJLIW: What would you like people to know about the beautiful soul your son was?

CONNELLY: I was told that he stuck up for other kids who people were bullying. You didn’t call it bullying back in those days.

I found out afterward that he pushed hundreds of cars out of snowbanks. He would go by the cleaners, and if the lady was there late cleaning up, he would hurry and clean up with her so she could get out early.

He was a good soul. He was six-foot-one-and-a-half at 15. He had a brother who was eight who idolized him.

My husband had a heart attack at the morgue. My husband died eight years later.

Believe me, the person that killed my son killed my husband. And I won’t let him kill any more of us. I won’t.

I’m using that time to fight for other people who’ve had to endure what our family had to endure.

MYCHAJLIW: Is that pain, that agony that never goes away, why this incident at Stony Brook hurt so badly?

CONNELLY: They have no comprehension.

It smacked me really hard.

I wanted the message to get out. I want to make my voice heard.

Stony Brook, what are you thinking about? Wolfie, if you’re representing all this great stuff and energy for the sports teams, didn’t you have any idea what you were doing there?

MYCHAJLIW: What do you hope happens next?

CONNELLY: I hope Stony Brook will have the families of murdered victims and all other kinds of crime victims come to their school and speak to the kids they’re teaching.

Care about crime happening to your next-door neighbor. Care about crime that’s happening in your school.

We’re not doing it for us. We’re done. Our story is over. We’re doing it for the other people.

MYCHAJLIW: On behalf of the South Shore Press, God bless you and your family. I wish we never had to meet this way, but I do appreciate you taking the time and sharing your thoughts.

CONNELLY: Thank you. And I say that to everybody when I meet them for the first time.

I wish we didn’t have to meet this way.

Thank you for saying that.