Gray ‘looking for friends’

Joe Macekna, Media General News Service
Published: July 29, 2008

RICHMOND — Ricky Jovan Gray is looking for friends.

Gray, awaiting execution for murdering the Harvey family in the basement of their Richmond home on New Year’s Day 2006, has had his contact information posted on a Web site soliciting potential pen pals.

“I like to read. I play chess I’m into sports, but I’m reduced to just watching them on TV now,” Gray tells potential correspondents on a site provided by Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty.

The group has posted profiles from several death-row inmates interested in corresponding with people on the outside.

“Everyone enjoys being remembered at special times of the year,” the group said. “Even if you are not interested in pursuing a pen-pal relationship, we hope you’ll consider sending a greeting card to any of those on either of Virginia’s Death Rows or to the men on Federal Death Row for crimes committed in Virginia.”

The group posts the address for Gray, who is being housed at the Sussex I State Prison in Waverly after being convicted of killing Bryan and Kathryn Harvey and their daughters, Stella, 9, and Ruby, 4.

Authorities said Gray admitted slashing the throats of all four victims in their Woodland Heights home.

Gray, accused of murder in the 2005 death of Reva resident Sherri Warner, had his case suspended June 4 in Culpeper.

Gray has been convicted on five counts of capital murder and faces two death sentences — for killing the two girls.

Gray and his nephew, Ray Joseph Dandridge, were accused of taking part in the Harvey murders and in the Jan. 6, 2006, murders of Mary Tucker, her husband, Percyell Tucker, and Mary Tucker’s daughter, Ashley Baskerville, also in South Richmond.

Coincidentally, Baskerville, who police say had served as a lookout during the Harvey slayings, had met Dandridge through a Web site for prison pen pals. “I’m an open minded and very romantic and understanding person,” Dandridge said in his posting. “I believe in treating others as I want to be treated and respected in life.”

Dandridge pleaded guilty to capital murder, with a plea-agreement sentence of life with no release.

Gray is one of nine inmates with profiles on the group’s site.

“The men and women who have placed their information on the site are simply letting us know that they are receptive to the idea of making new friends,” the group’s site says.

“Who they write, when they write, and what they write is up to them.”

According to the Web site, it was founded in 1991 by 13 people who opposed the death penalty.

It was originally called Virginians Against State Killing and changed its name a year later.

Gray, now 31, tells potential pen pals he is particularly interested in religion, politics and books.

When asked what qualities he would like to find in a pen pal, Gray, whom authorities believe was responsible for nine deaths over a three-month period, wrote:

“Someone you can call a true friend.”

Joe Macenka is a staff writer for the Richmond Times-Dispatch.