On December 31, 2014, his sentence was commuted to life without parole by outgoing governor Martin O'Malley who reprieved all four members of Maryland's death row.
[3] While going through security at Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport on his way to Miami a baggage screener noticed a substantial amount of cash in Grandison's luggage.
Marshals service later arrested him on suspicion of violating his parole, and a search of his belongings revealed a key for a room at the Warren House Motel (now a Howard Johnson's) in Pikesville, Maryland.
A search of the room found a substantial amount of cocaine and heroin, which resulted in Grandison being indicted on federal drug charges.
[7][8] After several years of appeals, Grandison's original death sentence was vacated on the basis of inadequate jury instructions in July 1992, as a result of the Supreme Court's decision in another case, Mills v. Maryland.