(ABC 6 News) – Two years into his 30-year sentence, Lil Robert Vincent Barnes will be sitting before a parole board in less than a week with a chance to be freed into a work release program.

In 2022, Barnes was charged and convicted of theft and arson in a series of crimes along 12th Street NE in Mason City, Iowa.

LD’s Filling Station was one of two businesses that burned down (the other, Coin Laundry Center, never recovered), and has spent the last couple years coming back from the brink, reopening just a year ago.

Now, the victims are facing it all over again.

“It’s very heartbreaking,” said Lori Schade, owner of LD’s. “For us, for the other two businesses, for the community, for our families.”

According to the Iowa Department of Corrections, Barnes’ release comes at their recommendation of him being a “safe” and “good” candidate for work release.

Schade begs to differ.

“I personally feel this is a safety issues,” she said. “When he was put away we thought, ‘Ok, we’re safe’, and who would have thought in two years with a 30 year sentence that our safety could be at risk.”

They aren’t the only ones shocked.

Those who put him in prison are also feeling the disappointment.

“When a court sentences someone, when a judge says someone’s going to prison for 30 years, then two years later they’re eligible for parole, that’s definitely a frustrating situation,” said Brendon Moe, assistant attorney for Cerro Gordo County.

Moe was the prosecuting attorney on Barnes’ case, and says it comes down to Iowa statutes on how long a person has to serve time before becoming eligible.

“In these case, when there’s not a mandatory minimum for any of the charges that he was sentenced to, it’s within (the Department of Corrections) discretion to decide when to make that recommendation to the parole board,” he said.

For Schade, however, the fight for justice isn’t over.

“He put a lot of lives in danger and the community deserves to know what he has done in the past and what’s going on right now,” she said.

Barnes’ parole board hearing is Wednesday, September 11 at 9:00 A.M.