The very first parole hearing for Nathan Brooks has been rescheduled for November 18th by the state of Ohio Parole Board.
Brooks, now 47 years old, has spent the last 30 years incarcerated after he was arrested near the Mount Zion Cemetery along Riggs Road in Belmont County soon after he murdered both his parents inside the family’s home on Sept. 30, 1995. He was charged with the murders after stabbing his mother and shooting and beheading his father as part of a Satanic ritual.
Once it was decided he would be tried as an adult, he was lodged in the former Belmont County Jail and then moved to the former Barnesville City Jail.
Brooks was convicted in October 1996 of two counts of aggravated murder, and he’s been lodged in the London Correctional Institution since a jury of six men and six women found the teenager guilty on two charges of aggravated murder and of using a firearm in the commission of a felony. Deliberations in the double murder case took under three hours to complete, and he was then sentenced to a pair of 20-year life sentences plus an additional three years for the use of a firearm while committing the murders.
The life sentences, as per the late Belmont County Judge Charles Knapp, were to run consecutively. He has lived as Prisoner #A337726 since his arrival on October 27, 1996.
Belmont County Prosecutor Kevin Flanagan has communicated with the Parole Board because of the details of the case, and he does not believe the felon will be paroled.
“I wrote a letter arguing against release,” he said. “I will attend the hearing and can not even speak at the hearing. If parole is recommended, then we can present evidence at a full board hearing.
“I don’t believe parole will be recommended,” Flanagan said.
Brooks has been one of approximately 2,500 inmates in the facility that rests within Union Township in Madison County, and the double murder has become known through the years as “The Devil of Bellaire” and “Dark Prince of Belmont County”.
According to the website for the Department of Rehabilitation & Correct, Brooks was eligible for parole in August 2025, but the hearing was delayed at that time. According to Ohio Revised Code Section 5149.10, the Parole Board was created as a section within the Adult Parole Authority and can consist of up to 12 members.
