It seems like a choice as easy as the bitter dregs of gray winter vs. the warm embrace of blue-skies spring. On one side is cold anger, revenge and denial. On the other is a woman who counts the days in prison, locked away from her son and family because she shot and killed a stalker to protect them and herself.
The Ohio Parole Board thought it was an easy call too. On March 29, the 11-member board voted unanimously to deny even a work furlough that would let Debbie Hill get a job during the days and spend nights at a halfway house closer to her Loveland family.
''We spent a heck of a lot of time on this case, and everybody was very comfortable with that decision,'' said Parole Board Chairperson Margerette Ghee. She said the denial was based on ''the totality of information. There is a lot of information you are not privy to.''
Such as stacks of mail. Letters from friends, family and church members urge parole, part of a quiet crusade of prayer and protest that has decorated three counties with bright yellow ribbons.
On the other side are letters from some law enforcement officers and the family and friends of Omar Pierson, the stalker she shot through a rolled-up window as he approached her car on a rural road on Nov. 2, 1994.
''It's almost even-Steven, a little bit more in favor of release,'' Ms. Ghee said. The mail makes a difference, she said: ''If we went only by the victim's family and prosecutors, we'd never parole anyone.''
But it sounded as if the vote to deny parole was influenced by two other factors: Debbie Hill's bargain to plead guilty, and her wrong turn on the night she killed her former boyfriend.
The sweet deal: ''Let me tell you, Southern Ohio is the toughest sentencing place in the state, and she got a hell of a break,'' said Ms. Ghee. In return for her guilty plea, Mrs. Hill was sentenced to six months for negligent homicide and 2-10 years for carrying a concealed weapon. She has now served about one year in a women's prison in Columbus.
Her lawyer, R. Scott Croswell III, agreed the plea-bargain deal was a no-brainer. ''They gave her such a sweet deal, no defense lawyer could refuse it. They brought the deal to us. They proposed it.''
The veteran of more than 100 murder cases said, ''I've only seen one or two deals as sweet.''
But it went sour. In plea negotiations, Mr. Croswell said, ''People had given the impression that six months would be enough. The judge let her plea to negligent homicide and agreed six months was enough, and the prosecutor indicated privately he could live with that.
''I believed it was fifty-fifty that the judge would shock her out (on probation) after 90 days.''
Instead, Warren County Judge P. Daniel Fedders denied probation. And the prosecutor's office still opposes parole a year later.
A wrong turn: Mr. Croswell called the case ''as defensible as they get.'' But he also admits that by leaving her driveway and following Mr. Pierson on the night of the shooting, Mrs. Hill weakened her claim to self-defense by not fleeing instead. And if a jury convicted her on even a reduced charge of involuntary manslaughter, she faced 12 years.
After her husband died of cancer, Mrs. Hill dated Mr. Pierson, then broke up with him and the stalking began. She and her son endured months of grinding fear, constant threats and an attempted break-in, as police and courts repeatedly failed to protect them at their remote farmhouse near Maineville.
One wrong turn, and the victim suddenly becomes the criminal.
''I believe he provoked her with a systematic course of terrorist threats,'' Mr. Croswell said. ''If asking for what you got was a defense, this would be a laydown. What he got, he brought on. No one can objectively look at this and deny that.''
He quoted a closing argument from another lawyer in another trial: ''The deceased bought his own ticket to hell.''
Mr. Croswell hoped for lenience from the judge and prosecutor, but never expected the Parole Board to allow early release before 16 months. ''We discussed that hell would freeze over before the Parole Board would release her after six months,'' he said.
Ms. Ghee blamed ''confusion'' and ''misstatements'' by the Department of Corrections, that mixed up parole and work-furlough hearings and encouraged false hopes for parole on March 29.
Mrs. Hill's next hearing is in June for possible release in August, Ms. Ghee said: ''This is the biggie.''
So now we know the penalty for women who discover that paper court orders can't stop a deranged and dangerous stalker, and turn to Smith & Wesson for protection that the cops and judges can't provide: 16 months.
Some people ask me to ''Please keep writing about Debbie Hill.'' Others ask, ''Why do you keep writing about her?''
A woman who doesn't belong in prison is counting the days of another spring.
It's an easy choice.
Peter Bronson is editorial page editor of The Enquirer. If you have questions or comments, call 768-8301, or write to 312 Elm Street, Cincinnati, Ohio 45202.
