The rise in California life prisoners’ parole grants has had nothing to do with the federal court mandate to reduce overcrowding in California’s prisons, said Gov. Jerry Brown’s office.
“The prison population has no bearing on the governor’s decision to reverse or not act on a parole grant,” said Evan Westrup, a spokesperson for Brown.
“Authorities say the higher numbers are primarily the result of a state Supreme Court decision in 2008 that set a new legal standard for the Board of Parole Hearings and the Governor’s Office to use when determining who is suitable for parole,” reported the San Diego Union Tribune.
Until the early 2000s, the prospects were slim for prisoners sentenced to life with the possibility of parole in California ever to walk out of prison. According to the California Lifer Newsletter, Gov. Gray Davis paroled only eight life prisoners during his administration from 1999 to 2003.
But things have changed. In 2008, the state Supreme Court decided that parole could not be denied simply because the life prisoner’s crime was “heinous, atrocious or cruel.” The denial must be based on whether the prisoner remains a danger to public safety if released.
In 2009, a federal three-judge court decided that overcrowding in California’s prisons was the primary cause for the state’s failure to provide adequate medical care to its prisoners. It ordered a cap on the state prison population of 137.5 percent of design capacity and required Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to submit plans to reduce overcrowding in the state prisons.
Since then the numbers of lifer prisoners paroled have steadily increased, from 221 in 2009 to 596 in 2013, according to the San Diego Union Tribune. This year, more than 280 life prisoners were paroled from prison as of June 30.
State law bars the parole board from taking prison overcrowding into account when making its decisions. However, there may be a perception that the issues are related because of the state’s efforts to comply with the federal court order, said Jennifer Shaffer, executive officer of the Board of Parole Hearings.
