'LIFE' TERM ENDS AFTER SEVEN YEARSMiami Herald, The (FL) - April 28, 1986Author: AL MESSERSCHMIDT Herald Staff WriterReadability: 6-8 grade level (Lexile: 1000)The two young men who cruised north on Interstate 95 in a red Grand Prix in August 1977 had two things in common: money and drugs.

Robert Topping, 20 years old, heir to a sports empire, wanted cocaine. He carried $46,770 in a brown Gucci bag.

Barry Adler, 18 years old, a small-time drug dealer and the son of an insurance agency owner, wanted money. He had a hammer, at least one knife and possibly a .25-caliber handgun in the back seat of the car.

Topping was murdered that night. His throat was cut and he was stabbed 33 times. Adler later pleaded guilty to second- degree murder.

The sentence was stiff: life in prison plus 99 years.

Then-Circuit Judge Alan Schwartz said at the Jan. 8, 1979, sentencing hearing that he wanted Adler to stay in prison forever.

On Tuesday, after serving seven years, three months and 20 days in prison, Barry Adler will be paroled.

"It doesn't surprise me," said Schwartz, now chief judge of the Third District Court of Appeal. "But I am appalled."

"A mockery of justice," said former prosecutor Lance Stelzer, who negotiated the guilty plea with Adler's lawyers.

Adler will be freed because the Florida parole board has, hearing after hearing, year after year, nibbled away at his sentence.

Adler's attorney, Marshall Cassedy, said the sentence reductions are a reward for good conduct in prison. Adler enrolled in college courses, joined the Jaycees and tutored Spanish-speaking inmates who wanted to learn English.

Prosecutors say that the reductions resulted from the persistence of Adler's appeals to the parole board, and he should not yet be freed.

"As long as you behave as a model prisoner," Stelzer said, "you can kill a person in the most brutal fashion and onlyserve seven years."

* * *

Robert Reed Topping had everything to live for when he stepped off an Atlanta-to-Miami flight on Aug. 16, 1977.

A sophomore at Emory University in Atlanta, he was listed in social registers. He was the son of Dan Topping, a one-time owner of the New York Yankees, and the stepson of Rankin Smith, owner of the Atlanta Falcons.

Robert Topping was no stranger in Miami. He was a graduate of Ransom Everglades School in Coconut Grove and Miami Beach High. Homicide detectives said he visited Miami 10 times, maybe 15 times, in the six months before his murder.

Topping came to Miami for cocaine.

Adler, who also had attended Ransom Everglades, was one of Topping's drug sources, according to Circuit Court files. Instead of returning to a summer job at a day-care center, Barry Adler waited to leave for college and dealt in drugs.

He told police he pocketed between $15,000 and $20,000 "tax free" selling cocaine and marijuana -- enough to buy a boat, a stereo, stylish clothes, expensive winners and racing tires for his car.

Topping came to Miami at Adler's request. More than 20 pounds of cocaine was available, Adler said.

Less than 25 minutes after his flight landed, Topping was dead.

Adler and his close friend, 19-year-old Andrew Schell, were quickly identified as suspects. When Adler was first questioned by homicide detectives, he said he knew nothing about the murder. He said he was asked to pick up Topping at the airport. The car he was in broke down, he said; the horn was stuck, and he cut his hands fixing it.

Adler said he knew nothing about drugs or drug money.

As Miami homicide detectives learned more about the murder, Adler began blaming Schell and Schell began blaming Adler. Schell was charged as an accessory and sentenced to five years' probation. He agreed to testify against Adler.

According to Schell's statements, he was driving the Grand Prix. Topping was in the front seat, Adler in the back. Topping's briefcase, filled with cash, was in the trunk.

Schell said Adler began stabbing Topping. "What are you doing, Barry? Stop!" Topping said. "You can have the money, whatever you want. Just let me go."

Schell said he drove with his left hand and tried to stop the stabbing with his right.

Schell said Adler pushed Topping from the car near Northeast 83rd Street and Fourth Place. "I floored the car," he said, and drove to a Howard Johnson's motel on Biscayne Boulevard, where Adler had already reserved a room.

In a series of statements, after waiving immunity from prosecution, Adler claimed he was the driver of the Grand Prix. He refused to take a polygraph test.

Schell bought a hammer, he said. "He told me he was going to hit Bob with it and knock him right out," Adler said.

"All of a sudden it was -- all these motions that he was stabbing him with two hands," Adler said.

Adler lied about having none of the money and about his involvement in the murder, Stelzer said. Miami police recovered the $46,770 from Patrick Zito, who got it from Adler's sister, Cindy, according to court files.

* * *

When Barry Adler stood before Judge Schwartz for sentencing, he sobbed hysterically and shouted: "I've been railroaded by my lawyers."

"I didn't mean to plead guilty," Adler told the judge. "I want a jury."

"I do not believe a word the defendant has said," Schwartz said.

Adler pleaded guilty to murder, robbery and kidnapping charges. He avoided a first-degree murder conviction, a possible death sentence and a mandatory 25 years in prison.

Under Florida law in 1979, circuit judges sentenced convicted felons and the Florida Parole Commission decided how long they stayed in prison. Sentences in Florida are now controlled by sentencing guidelines.

When Adler began his sentence of life plus 99 years at the DeSoto Correctional Center in Central Florida, he was assigned a "presumptive" release date in the year 2002. The parolecommission concluded, after reviewing Adler's case, that the maximum time he would serve in prison was 24 years.

Adler wasn't present at the parole hearings that followed. His attorney, Cassedy, former executive director of the Florida Bar Association, argued at every hearing for additional reductions in Adler's sentence.

Cassedy said Adler was a model prisoner. Parole commission reports say Adler showed "exceptional program achievement, above-average work and good participation in civic activities." Supporting the claim for early release were letters to the parole board from state Sen. Carrie P. Meek, D-Miami, and then- state Rep. Barry Kutun, D-Miami Beach. Kutun is now a Democratic candidate for governor.

Cassedy and parole commission chairman Ken Simmons said last week that Adler was treated the same as other inmates when his sentence was reduced.

"Everybody's given the same type of consideration by thecommission," Simmons said. "He's completed a lot of programs. He's got quite a list of accomplishments here."

The following parole hearings were held:

* 1979, while Adler was in the DeSoto Correctional Center. Recommended release date: 2002.

* 1980, DeSoto. Release date: 1991.

* 1981, DeSoto. Release date: June 22, 1989.

* 1982, DeSoto. No change in date.

* 1983, Dade Correctional Institution. No change in date, although a hearing examiner recommended immediate parole.

* 1984, Dade Correctional. Recommended release date: June 1988.

* 1985, North Miami work-release center. Release date: June 1986.

* April 1986, Hollywood work-release center. Release date: April 29, 1986.

"It seems as if there's an indication where Mr. Adler believes that if one does good after a very terrible crime and speaks long, loud and hard, someone's going to listen; someone's going to mitigate it down," prosecutor Michael Cornely told thecommission in 1984. "But there is a degree of punishment for this type of crime which I believe the commission should keep in mind."

For more than a year, Adler has been living as a prisoner at night and as a civilian employee of a Southwest Dade furniture company during the day.

Adler leaves the Hollywood work-release center at 10 a.m. and returns after work. He is paid $210 a week.

Adler did not return phone calls and did not respond to a telegram sent to his place of employment, Caty's Furniture Co.

In a March 11, 1986, letter to the parole commission, Adler's father said his son will begin working at the Adler and Adler Insurance Agency when he is paroled. The letter says Adler is enrolled in a college course "which will satisfy part of his requirement" for a state insurance agent's license.

A spokesman for state Insurance Commissioner Bill Gunter said last week it is unlikely that Adler will receive an insurance agent's license upon release from prison. Florida law bars Gunter from licensing anyone who has been convicted of a crime of "moral turpitude."

Adler plans to live with his parents upon release.

"I sincerely hope that Barry Adler has rehabilitatedhimself," said former prosecutor Stelzer. "If you release him after seven years, you're telling society that that's all a human life is worth."

Caption: photo: Barry ADLER, Alan SCWARTZEdition: FINAL Section: LOCAL Page number: 1B Record: 8602030202 Index terms: MURDER HISTORY CHRONOLOGY SENTENCE CHANGECopyright: Copyright (c) 1986 The Miami Herald