HARTFORD (AP) — A Connecticut inmate who helped start a mentoring program for younger prisoners has had his sentence reduced and could be released next year.

Clyde Meikle, 49, who was convicted of murder in the shotgun slaying of a cousin in 1994, was granted a sentence modification Friday from 50 to 28 years in prison by Superior Court Judge David Gold.

Those supporting the move had citied Meikle's work as a founding member of TRUE, a housing unit at the Cheshire Correctional Institution that pairs inmates serving long sentences with young inmates in an attempt to show them how to avoid a similar fate.

“Clyde’s work underscores the need to follow and learn from people with lived experience in order to truly transform the criminal legal system,” said Ryan Shanahan, director of Restoring Promise, a prison reform group that worked with Meikle. “His contributions have helped improve the safety, well-being, and healing of young men in Connecticut’s prisons and will continue to shape Restoring Promise’s efforts to ensure dignity for young adults in prison.”

Meikle was convicted of shooting Clifford Walker in the stomach with a shotgun after the two argued over where a car should be parked.

Meikle’s petition for a modified sentence was opposed by several members of Walker's family but supported by officials including former Correction Commissioner Scott Semple and James Rovella, the commissioner of the Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection, who was a police detective when he arrested Meikle in 1994.