Gov. Brown denies parole for almost all of parole board’s recommended release candidates with murder charges

by Brian Leubitz

This is a failing system:

California Gov. Jerry Brown pardoned 21 people in his first year in office and rejected parole for 71 first- and second-degree murderers who had been recommended for release by the parole board.

Brown did allow for the early release of just one person, Tung Nguyen of Garden Grove, who was convicted of first-degree murder for his role in a motel-room killing in a dispute over money. … Unlike the 71 other such recommendations rejected by Brown, the governor approved Nguyen’s parole, based in part on his role in helping 50 civilians to safety who were on the prison yard during a 2006 inmate riot.

There was once a point to a parole board. They were doctors and social workers who specialized in examining risk to the public. They still are the same people, but now their recommendations are completely ignored. Few of the violent offenders that are recommended for early release are actually released. Offenders with “life” sentences that are eligible for parole should just consider the first word, and forget the rest.

Since the governor was granted the power to reject parole board recommendations, rarely has a governor not taken advantage of that power. There is simply no real upside of releasing a prisoner, but the downside political risk is huge.  And so nobody gets released.  We have a prison system that ignores rehabilitation and simply warehouses people.

It is massively expensive but not particularly effective. But nobody ever got voted out of office for keeping an offender behind bars, and so the cycle continues.

A full report on Brown’s pardons and parole releases is here.