Positive programming, accountability, and suitability not enough to release term-to-life residents no longer a threat to public safety

San Quentin residents serving a life term have been approved for release, but litigation has kept them in custody; as a result, two lifers share their views on rehabilitation and good time credits.

In 2016, both California voters approved the Public Safety and Rehabilitation Act (Proposition 57). The law gave good conduct and milestone credits to people serving indeterminate terms who participate in positive programming.

The Criminal Justice Legal Foundation sued CDCR saying that according to Prop 57 the Department had no authority to award lifers good time credits. 

The Sacramento County Superior Court placed an injunction on past and future credit earning for people serving life terms, including those who have been found suitable for parole.

The Court of Appeal affirmed the lower court decision on July 28, 2025 and remanded the case back to the lower court stating in part, “We hold that (1) Proposition 57 properly removed statutory restrains on the department’s authority to award credits, allowing the regulations to supersede contrary statutes.” (Citation: 2025 Cal.App LEXIS 480).

“Critics of credit earning just don’t get it; they are misinformed by sources that speculate,” said 61-year-old SQ resident Mark Hernandez. “They should take a closer look at lifer’s positive programming. We are accountable for our actions, not because we have to, but because we want to.” 

Hernandez has served 17 years of a 21-years-to-life sentence. His original release date was 2029, but he was granted parole early on June 18, 2024 because of rehabilitative credits he has earned. 

Hernandez said that he decided to change the day he was arrested. He made a commitment not to participate in prison politics and engaged in religious studies, educational programming, Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous.

“We can never take back what we did; all we can do is change who we were. That’s the essence of rehabilitation,” Hernandez said. 

He welcomes critics and victims’ rights advocates to come inside prison and talk with residents to witness the work they are doing.

Hernandez added that CDCR has afforded positive programming for everybody and that if it were not for the self-help groups at SQ, his rehabilitation would have been a struggle. 

Hernandez was not the only person stripped of his credits; there are numerous lifers at SQ whose release has been stalled. 

SQ resident Ricardo Romero, 48, was arrested April 14, 2000; he was eventually sentenced to 25-years-to-life. He went to the Board of Parole Hearings on January 24, 2023, and was denied three years.

In 2026 he was scheduled to go back to BPH but ended up going earlier because of his positive programming, and on August 7, 2024 Romero was found suitable for parole. 

“I believe good time credits would enable better conduct,” Romero said. “It’s my belief that if you provide a person with an incentive for positive conduct, their natural instinct would be to conform in order to receive a reward.”

He believes incarcerated people would get into less trouble if they could receive good time credits, and by attending rehabilitative activities, they would see the harm they’ve caused. 

Romero said that program credits should apply to all incarcerated people who invest in healthier ways to deal with their violence, criminality, and addiction. 

“If I’m putting in the work to learn how to address my causative factors, character defects and contributing factors related to my crime, I should be able to receive credits,” Romero said. “These efforts are to ensure I never victimize anyone again.”

The California Legislature is trying to make credit-earning law with Assembly Bill 622. It reads in part: “… the Secretary of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation shall apply all applicable credits promulgated pursuant to the secretary’s authority under subdivision (b) of Section 32 of Article I of the California Constitution.”

“I should have been home in December 2024, yet I am still here,” Romero said. “All in all, there is a huge discrepancy in credit earnings that should not exist for people serving indeterminate terms.”