Judge keeps bail the same for paroled Rockland murderer Robert McCain in Cortlandt groping case

Robert McCain, one of two men convicted a 1980 murder in Rockland County and later paroled, has been freed from a Westchester jail after serving four months for groping a woman.

In July, McCain, who was residing in Verplanck and working as a mechanic, was accused of forcible touching after a woman accused him of groping her at a dog park in Cortlandt.

The 64-year-old pleaded guilty to forcible touching, a Class A misdemeanor, in early October. But he had been kept behind bars on a parole violations due to the groping case.

On Oct. 22, the state released McCain and he resumed his status as a parolee, according to a New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision statement. A state parolee database check confirmed his release on supervision.

A notorious and vicious killing

McCain was released on parole in 2021. He has been sentenced to 40 years in prison for the brutal murder of Paula Bohovesky in Pearl River.

On Oct. 28, 1980, McCain and his co-conspirator, Richard LaBarbera, attacked Paula Bohovesky, a Pearl River High School junior and aspiring artist who was walking home from her after-school job at the library. She was bashed in the head and stabbed.

Both were convicted of second-degree murder in 1981 and were sentenced to 40 years.

Every time the men came up for parole, the community had rallied to keep them behind bars.

LaBarbera was released in 2019, reincarcerated three weeks later for a parole violation after he got drunk, and re-released in 2020. LaBarbera is no longer under parole.

Resentment at release, again

Rockland County Executive Ed Day on Oct. 24 blasted McCain's latest release.

"We fought tirelessly to keep this egregious killer, Robert McCain, behind bars for the brutal and unspeakable murder of Paula Bohovesky," he said on Oct. 24, referencing a years' long effort to get the parole board to deny earlier parole bids. "The decision to release him again shows how the system keeps failing victims, their families, and the community. Will they ever learn?"

Bob Baird is a retired newspaper columnist and friend of Paula's mother, Lois Bohovesky, who is now in her early 90s. He said McCain's release, after admitting wrongdoing while on parole, was wrong.

"That doesn't seem to equate when the other individual who was convicted got a year's additional time for a violation of being drunk," Baird said. "You would think a crime against an individual would be worth at least that if not more."

The Bohovesky murder case has spurred New York lawmakmakers to seek state and federal versions of "Paula's Law," which would ban parole for anyone convicted of killing a child under 18 during a sexual assault.

Lohud's Jonathan Bandler contributed to this report.