Supervised, but free.

McBride, now 56, will have served nine years of his 25-year sentence for driving drunk and causing an accident that killed 15-year-old Brad Patrick inDecember 1989. Patrick’s death enraged the east Rowan community, where he was a student at East Rowan High School.

Originally, McBride received a life sentence for the second-degree murder conviction, a ground-breaking conviction for a drunken driver.

The N.C. Court of Appeals upheld the conviction but overturned the sentence as excessive.

On Sept. 27, 1993, Judge James M. Webb reduced the life sentence to 25 years, including credit for time served.

The Fair Sentencing Act applies to McBride’s sentence and cut his from 25 years to 12 1

In 1994, the legislature adopted the Structured Sentencing system, which requires inmates to serve the sentence issued.

Brad Patrick’s father, Terry, said Thursday that his family is not sure what they are going to do after McBride’s release.

“We’ve done probably everything we could do as far as keeping him confined,” Terry Patrick said.

McBride will be on supervised parole until July 27.

According to Terry Patrick, parole officials “can take it the nth degree or they can be pretty flexible” regarding McBride’s supervision.

Neither McBride nor members of his family could be reached for comment. The N.C. Department of Corrections does not release information about how to contact friends or family of prisoners.

Though McBride will have served less than half of his original sentence, Terry Patrick and his wife, Lynne, are pleased with the time he has served.

The Patricks, their neighbors in eastern Rowan County and students with the East Rowan High School Brad Patrick Students Against Drunk Driving Chapter have petitioned the Parole Commission in Raleigh to deny McBride parole.

“It is kind of at that point that you feel helpless. But I don’t know,” Patrick said.