Former Kansas City police detective Eric DeValkenaere has sentence commuted by Gov. Parson

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) - Eric DeValkenaere will be home for Christmas. Late Friday afternoon Missouri Governor Mike Parson commuted Devalkenaere for the December 2019 killing of Cameron Lamb.

Lamb was shot and killed by DeValkenaere as he was backing a truck into a garage at his home. DeValkenaere’s attorneys argued the detective and his partner were doing their jobs, following up on reports that Lamb’s vehicle had been chasing another car through town.

The attorneys argued that the detectives believed Lamb was reaching for a gun and DeValkenaere was worried about his partner.

DeValkenaere was convicted in a bench trial of second-degree manslaughter in the case. He was sentenced to six years in prison, but his legal team appealed. He was allowed to stay out of jail while awaiting an appeal decision. The appeal was denied, and DeValkenaere was taken into custody in October 2023.

Campaign for release

Family and friends of DeValkenaere have been fighting for his release since his conviction. His family submitted a clemency petition with the Governor’s office and urged friends and associates to write letters to the governor.

Sarah DeValkenaere even took to radio last year to campaign for her husband’s release. She claimed there were faces in the case that many people didn’t know.

“He made our city safer. And now to sit in jail, and to be away from his family, for getting up and going to work one day and doing his job, is wrong. Another detective is home with his wife and his four children because of my husband’s heroic actions that day,” said Sarah DeValkeneare in the radio appeal.

The governor’s office has acknowledged it has received an informal request for clemency and hundreds of additional calls, letters and emails on DeValkenaere’s behalf.

Missouri Governor-elect Mike Kehoe has shared publicly his opinion that DeValkenaere should be released.

“I’ve been very vocal about saying, should I succeed in running for governor, Eric DeValkenaere will be home with his family,” Kehoe said in November.

Lamb’s family keeps his memory alive

Cameron Lamb’s family has waged its own campaign to keep DeValkenaere in prison. They have also written letters to the governor and have been very vocal that he should serve his sentence.

“I am asking that you respect the rule of law, as I have always done. A man found guilty… should not be pardoned. Pardoning him would not be the right thing to do,” Laurie Bey, Lamb’s mother, said previously.

On the fifth anniversary of Lamb’s death, Dec. 3, Lamb’s family and friends hosted a vigil in is memory.

READ MORE: ‘The law clearly spoke’: Cameron Lamb’s family wants Mike Kehoe to keep Eric Devalkenaere imprisoned

Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker was among those in attendance. She was the attorney for the prosecution in DeValkenaere’s trial. She responded to Kehoe’s claim that DeValkenaere’s sentencing was “unjust” from a “woke prosecutor.”

“I’ve been a prosecutor for 28 years. I don’t respond to someone that debases my 28 years in a variety of different roles at that time to a four letter word,” she said.

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