CDCR Star

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Federal ed grant funds extended to inmates

Scott Carpenter, The Union Democrat

Inmates at the Sierra Conservation Center soon will be eligible for federal grants to attend classes taught by Columbia College professors.

The program, announced late last week, is a pilot for the U.S. Department of Education and 67 schools across the nation.

Columbia College has worked with the prison to offer courses from art history to speech since last fall.

Film, chat explores higher education for inmates

Amy Maginnis-Honey, Daily Republic

FAIRFIELD — Representatives from law enforcement, education and the community attended a screening of “Zero Percent,” Monday at Solano Community College.

The film was shot inside New York’s Sing Sing Correctional Facility and focused on Hudson Link’s college degree program that started at the prison.

Sean Pica, executive director of Hudson Link, who was in the area to speak at San Quentin’s graduation, touted the importance of a college education.

Associate warden at Chowchilla prison held on child sex charges

Razi Syed, The Fresno Bee

An associate warden at the Central California Women’s Facility in Chowchilla was arrested Monday on suspicion of sexually abusing a minor, the Madera County Sheriff’s Office said.

Travis Wright, 45, of Coarsegold, was taken into custody Monday morning and booked on several sex-related offenses, the sheriff’s office said. The crimes are not related to his position with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Wright is not suspected of having committed any crimes at the prison.

Chowchilla state prison official arrested for child sex crimes

Christina Fan, abc

MADERA, Calif. (KFSN) -- An associate warden at the Central California Women's Facility is now facing child sex abuse charges after a two-month long investigation.

For the past several years at the facility Travis Wright has watched over inmates, but on Monday he found himself on the other side of those bars.

Madera County Sheriff's deputies arrested 44-year-old Wright for several counts of sexual abuse. The charges resulted after a two-month investigation into crimes that happened more than 15 years ago.

Cal State LA selected for Obama Administration Second Chance Pell Program

Cal State LA

Cal State LA is one of several dozen universities across the nation selected to participate in an Obama Administration pilot program to allow incarcerated students to pursue bachelor's degrees and receive Pell Grants to help pay for their education, federal officials announced Friday.

The goal of the Second Chance Pell Pilot Program is to help reduce recidivism rates and make communities safer by educating incarcerated Americans so they can receive jobs and support their families after they are released from prison. Under the program, 67 universities and colleges will partner with more than 141 federal and state penal institutions to educate 12,000 students.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Crime Q&A: What happened to man who killed Sacramento State student in 1986?

Cathy Locke, The Sacramento Bee

Q: In 1987 or ’88, James Evans of Citrus Heights was convicted of killing his girlfriend. What ever happened with the case? Is James still incarcerated?

Mike, Fair Oaks

A: James Allen Evans remains in prison for the Aug. 26, 1986 slaying of 18-year-old Andrea Lynne Ross of Carmichael.

Fighting Fires, Doing Time: The Women’s Inmate Firefighting Crew

Great Big Story (CNN)

In a state devastated by an ongoing drought and seasonal wildfires, a select group of female inmates are doing their part to give back to California and save lives in the process. Fire crews made up of 200 women who are nonviolent offenders are being trained by professionals to fight the blazes, and it’s making a difference.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

4 guards injured in Lancaster prison inmate attacks

The Associated Press

LANCASTER, Calif. Authorities say four guards have been injured in inmate attacks at the California state prison in Lancaster.

Corrections officials say a convicted first-degree murderer attacked officers who were escorting his cellmate back to the cell Tuesday morning.

In the resulting melee, one guard was forced over a stair railing and fell one story. The other fell down the stairs while grappling with an inmate.

California Arts Council in the Money With New State Budget

Rachael Myrow, KQED

The California Arts Council continues its upward climb out of near financial starvation with news Tuesday that the new state budget includes a $10.8 million bump, bringing state support to the agency in fiscal year 2016-17 to roughly $21.1 million.

Included in that sum: a one-time only boost of $6.8 million for the council generally, and $4 million in ongoing funding for the state’s Arts in Corrections program, an initiative that provides arts programming to the state’s prisons.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Biology Behind Bars... The Prison University Project at San Quentin

IBIOLOGY

Inmates at San Quentin State Prison share their excitement and gratitude at being enrolled in an introductory biology course as part of the Prison University Project. Before being given this opportunity, many of the students didn’t believe they could attend college. Now they are excited to do experiments, they understand complex biological concepts and they are looking forward to using their newly developed skills to better themselves and society when they are released.

William Richards released from prison after 23 years for murder he didn't commit

ABC

VICTORVILLE, Calif. (KABC) -- A Southern California man walked out of prison on Tuesday after enduring more than 20 years behind bars for a murder he didn't commit.

William Richards walked out a free man after San Bernardino County District Attorney Michael Ramos dismissed charges against him.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

Manson murderer's 'disturbingly distorted' views should prevent her release from prison, D.A. says

Matt Hamilton, The Los Angeles Times

The Los Angeles County district attorney has asked Gov. Jerry Brown to deny parole for former Manson “family” member Leslie Van Houten, who was convicted along with other members of the cult in the 1969 killings of Leno and Rosemary LaBianca.

In a letter dated Friday, Dist. Atty. Jackie Lacey told the governor that she “strongly” opposed releasing Van Houten, calling her unsuitable for parole and a threat to public safety.

Manson ex-follower should be denied parole –prosecutor

Dan Whitcomb, Reuters

(Reuters) - Los Angeles' top prosecutor on Tuesday urged California Governor Jerry Brown to keep former Charles Manson follower Leslie Van Houten behind bars, despite the recommendation of a parole board that she be released.

Los Angeles County District Attorney Jackie Lacey said in a five-page letter to the governor that Van Houten's role in the Aug. 9, 1969, stabbing murders of Leno and Rosemary LaBianca and her still "disturbingly distorted" view of Manson made her unsuitable for parole.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Exclusive look at prison guards unique training

Brian Hickey, KCRA 3 News

KCRA 3’s Brian Hickey got an exclusive look at how California prison guards train for hostage situations, barricades and prisoners.

Drug use up in prisons with intensive programs, AP finds

Don Thompson, KPCC

Drug use behind bars appears to have increased since California started using drug-sniffing dogs and machinery to try to stop smuggling at state prisons, where overdose deaths are nearly five times the national rate, records show.

It's unclear exactly why things haven't gone as officials projected.

Some say the testing can yield artificially high results. Others say it's too soon to draw any long-term conclusions. Still more say the program simply is not working. Prison officials won't divulge details on results of the multimillion-dollar program.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Shakespeare releases the creativity in souls of inmates

Jesse Hamlin, The San Francisco Chronicle

Marin Shakespeare’s Lesley Currier got a letter some years back from Michael Willis, who’d played Puck in a San Quentin State Prison production of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” He was writing from his new cell at High Desert State Prison in Susanville (Lassen County) to say how rotten it was at that remote maximum-security facility with no theater program, and urging Currier to bring the Bard to that desolate place.

“He told me he missed Shakespeare,” says Currier, Marin Shakespeare’s managing director, who began working with inmates at San Quentin in 2003.

Local law school helps free wrongly convicted man

Salvador Rivera, Fox 5 News

SAN DIEGO -- Bill Richards was released from prison Tuesday after spending 23 years in custody for a crime he did not commit.

Richards was convicted of murdering his wife in 1993 after three separate trials.

Following his conviction, Richards wrote a letter to California Western School of Law's Innocence Project, asking it to look into his case. It did take on the case, and after years of trying to exonerate Richards, an expert witness finally admitted he made a mistake. This admission led to a judge reversing Richards' conviction seven years ago.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Why Prison Phone Rates Keep Going Up Even Though The FCC Regulated Them

Eric Markowitz, International Business Times

Families of prisoners in the U.S. pay as much as $1 a minute to talk to their loved ones behind bars, which is why the Federal Communications Commission stepped in last fall to regulate the industry, which is controlled by a few private firms. And yet families expecting financial relief got a surprise in June: Their rates went up, again.

“It’s salt in the wound,” said Connie Pratt, a 63-year-old woman from Chico, California, whose 33-year-old son is incarcerated in Northern California. Pratt, who lives on a $900 monthly disability check, says she had hoped the FCC action would lower the cost of talking to her son. Instead, she found that on June 20 — the day prices were supposed to go down — the bill for a 15-minute phone call to her son had increased from $7.20 to $9.77.

OPINION

A Prison That Offers Hope

Bill Keller, TIME

In theory, we put criminals in prison to punish them, to incapacitate them (for a time), to deter others from following their bad example and to rehabilitate them. Since well over 90% of offenders are eventually released back into society, you would think the last reason would be a priority: to instill the skills and self-discipline conducive to living within the law. But most prisons–remote from population centers, sequestered from society and often fearful of a political backlash if incarceration seems too “soft”–offer at most high school GED classes and manual-labor training, not exactly a passport to a stable life after prison.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

California governor denies parole for ex-Mexican Mafia chief

Don Thompson Associated Press

SACRAMENTO, Calif. Gov. Jerry Brown again blocked parole Thursday for a former leader of the Mexican Mafia prison gang who now helps law enforcement, discounting claims that the double murderer intended to enter the federal witness protection program.

The governor similarly rejected parole for Rene "Boxer" Enriquez last year after concluding he is at risk of being killed if he is freed. His release also would endanger those around him who might be caught in the crossfire, the governor said in his latest decision.

Jerry Brown’s parole measure makes November ballot

David Siders, The Sacramento Bee

Gov. Jerry Brown’s constitutional amendment to make some nonviolent felons eligible for early parole qualified for the November ballot on Thursday – the statutory deadline – after a harried signature-gathering effort and intervention from the California Supreme Court.

The measure’s qualification, the 15th for the fall ballot, followed a Supreme Court ruling earlier this month overturning a bid to block the measure on procedural grounds.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Working as a team

State’s inmates form crews to fight wildfires

Hector Gonzalez, Moorpark Acorn

Shouting in the dorm room startled Ventura fire camp inmate Luiz Galvez awake around 3 a.m. on a recent Thursday.

Still groggy, he slipped on his Nomex, a fire-resistant protective undergarment, put on the rest of his gear, stuffed his feet into boots and plodded, barely awake, outside onto a waiting bus.

An hour later, the 21-year-old Riverside man serving a three-year sentence for robbery was within feet of 7-foot-high flames, working methodically alongside other fire camp inmates to cut a defensible line around the Sherpa Fire in Santa Barbara.

“It’s like standing next to a bonfire,” said Galvez, an expert on the chainsaw, who completed a four-week basic training course at the California Department of Forestry and Fire Service’s James Town facility in Sonora.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Governor Brown Announces Appointments

Imperial Valley News

Sacramento, California - Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. today announced the following appointments:

Josephine Gastelo, 48, of Atascadero, has been appointed warden at the California Men’s Colony, where she has been acting warden since 2015 and has served in several positions since 2007, including chief deputy warden, associate warden and correctional business manager. She held several positions at Pleasant Valley State Prison from 1994 to 2007, including staff services manager, associate governmental program analyst and staff services analyst. She was a staff services analyst at North Kern State Prison from 1993 to 1994 and held several positions at California State Prison, Corcoran from 1988 to 1993, including personnel specialist and office assistant. This position does not require Senate confirmation and the compensation is $145,440. Gastelo is a Democrat.

Reforming criminal justice: Ideas from Silicon Valley

AEI

Last week, AEI sent a small team to the Bay Area to survey innovative programs that empower and reintegrate prisoners, the formerly incarcerated, and those at-risk of entering the criminal justice system.

Led by education policy studies resident fellow Gerard Robinson, we interviewed leaders in the nonprofit, business, and public sectors to discuss what works, what doesn’t, and what policymakers and philanthropists can do to improve outcomes for some of the most marginalized in our society today.

Cal State LA selected for Obama Administration Second Chance Pell Pilot Program

Parent Herald

CORRECTIONS RELATED

California Arts Council to receive funding increase

Joe Truskot, The Salinas Californian

Earlier this week, Gov. Jerry Brown signed a state budget that includes a $10.8 million funding increase for the California Arts Council.

“This funding is very good news for everyone in California,” said Paulette Lynch, executive director of the Arts Council of Monterey County, “and certainly potentially great news for Monterey County.”

This investment will extend the capacity of the California Arts Council to meet the needs and demand for arts programs benefiting diverse communities across the state, the Council stated. The budget includes a $6.8 million one-time increase for the Arts Council and an additional $4 million ongoing allocation for the state’s Arts in Corrections program.

CDCR NEWS

Atascadero woman appointed warden at California Men’s Colony

A-Town Daily News

Josephine Gastelo, 48, of Atascadero, has been appointed warden at the California Men’s Colony by Governor Brown, where she has been acting warden since 2015 and has served in several positions since 2007, including chief deputy warden, associate warden and correctional business manager.

She held several positions at Pleasant Valley State Prison from 1994 to 2007, including staff services manager, associate governmental program analyst and staff services analyst. She was a staff services analyst at North Kern State Prison from 1993 to 1994 and held several positions at California State Prison, Corcoran from 1988 to 1993, including personnel specialist and office assistant.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Canyon Country man serving two years for road rage incident a year ago

Jim Holt, Santa Clarita Valley Signal

One year after he was arrested for threatening another motorist with a fully automatic assault weapon, a Canyon Country man is behind bars in state prison serving a two-year sentence, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office said.

Mark Guerrero, now 39, began serving a two-year prison sentence at the North Kern State Prison in Delano on May 20, state prison records show.

California Court must honor plea agreement

Elizabeth Warmerdam, Courthouse News Service

An inmate's original plea agreement must be honored even though the superior court allowed the prosecution to make a last-minute amendment to the criminal complaint that left the inmate with an indeterminate life sentence, the Ninth Circuit ruled Thursday.

Michael Cuero pleaded guilty in 2005 to causing bodily injury while driving under the influence and unlawful possession of a firearm. He also admitted to a single prior strike conviction and four prison priors.

Lifer inmate’s art inspires, resonates at B’nai Abraham
Toby Tabachnick, Senior Staff Writer, The Jewish Chronicle

The drawing was done with a ballpoint pen, and the artist is not renowned — in fact, he is serving a life sentence at the Valley State Prison in Chowchilla, Calif. — but the framed image in the hallway near the entrance of B’nai Abraham may be one of the congregation’s most valued pieces.

The ink-on-paper drawing depicts two young people donned in tallit and surrounded by the tree of life, tefillin and other Jewish symbols. It was created in honor of this year’s class of confirmands, according to Cantor Michal Gray-Schaffer, spiritual leader of the Butler, Pa., congregation.

High-rise burglar charged in 1972 murder admits killing Santa Monica couple?

Hoa Quach, My News LA

A man charged with killing a 79-year-old Hollywood woman nearly 44 years ago admitted to police that he killed a Santa Monica couple in 1980 and was involved in a series of burglaries at high-rise apartment complexes, according to a prosecutor, but a defense attorney said there is “reasonable doubt” about his involvement in the 1972 killing.

Harold Holman, 69, was taken from court in a wheelchair to a courtroom lockup to listen to the proceedings on a speaker after telling a judge he was “not going to be part of a media circus” — in an apparent reference to a TV camera being allowed in court for the start of his trial for Helen Meyler’s Aug. 27, 1972, bludgeoning death.

Inmate dies at Tehachapi prison

The Bakersfield Californian

An inmate at the California Correctional Institution in Tehachapi died on June 28. Richard Arriola, 51, of Long Beach complained of illness and became unresponsive.

His condition declined until his death. A postmortem examination will be scheduled by the coroner’s office to determine cause and manner of death.

Vacaville man, convicted killer, loses appeal

Jess Sullivan, Daily Republic

VACAVILLE — A Vacaville man found guilty of murder at the close of a January 2013 jury trial lost his appeal Thursday in a San Francisco court.

Rico M. Espitia is serving a sentence of 50 years to life and is currently locked up Salinas Valley State Prison in Soledad.

Espitia, a gang member, shot and killed Quinten Nears in the parking lot of a Vacaville apartment complex on the night of July 30, 2011.

Ted Talks: Redemption song
Lou Simms, CCT News

John Legend is an American singer, musician and philanthropist. He uses music to improve humanity and spread love. He has done this and even penetrated prison walls. A place where the redemption song truly needs to be sang. Transformation is possible even in jails.

The question that Legend poses is one that wonders if it was possible to look at prisons differently. What if the rehabilitation of prisoners was done with love and compassion as the foundation? The society would be healthier and safer for children to be raised in.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Contraband investigated at Donovan State Prison

Pauline Repard, The San Diego Union-Tribune

An employee at Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in Otay Mesa has been suspended and an investigation launched after he was caught trying to smuggle in contraband, a prison official said Friday.

Staff working on a tip stopped the employee before he entered the prison, and confiscated the contraband on Sunday, said Lt. Philip Bracamonte, spokesman for the prison.

DEATH PENALTY

Measure to speed up executions in California qualifies for November ballot

Jazmine Ulloa, The LA Times

A death row inmate is escorted at San Quentin State Prison. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times)

An initiative that aims to speed up executions in California qualified for the Nov. 8 ballot on Thursday, making it one of two competing measures voters will weigh on the death penalty.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Solitary Cellars wines will set you free

By Robert Rodriguez, The Fresno Bee

It’s sometimes hard to figure out what Greg Bergersen and Rick Quesada enjoy more: being owners of an award-winning winery or talking about their days as correctional officers in some of the state’s toughest prisons.

Truth is, it’s both. As part of a law enforcement brotherhood, Bergersen and Quesada represent a tight-knit group of officers who are proud of the work they do.

Governor signs bill aiding Luther Jones

Record-Bee Staff

Sacramento Gov. Jerry Brown signed a measure on Friday providing Lake County resident Luther Ed Jones with $936,880 in compensation for the 18 years wrongfully spent in prison.

Senator Mike McGuire and Assemblymember Bill Dodd made the announcement Friday afternoon. Jones, now 71, has been facing significant medical issues, making the issue of his compensation more urgent.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

County wins 45 awards from National Association of Counties

Highland Community News

The County of San Bernardino’s innovative and groundbreaking programs earned 45 Achievement Awards from the National Association of Counties (NACo), continuing a tradition of recognition from the organization.

Every year, NACo recognizes programs across the country that modernize county government and increase services to county residents. This year, NACo awarded 618 entries from 112 counties in 34 states.

DEATH PENALTY

Senate candidate Loretta Sanchez supports ballot measure to repeal the death penalty

Phil Willon, Los Angeles Times

Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Orange) (Hayne Palmour IV / San Diego Union-Tribune)

Congresswoman and U.S. Senate candidate Loretta Sanchez on Wednesday announced her support for a statewide ballot measure to repeal the death penalty in California.
Sanchez, an Orange County Democrat first elected to Congress in 1996, said that the “death penalty in California remains an ineffective deterrent and does not meet the constitutional standards of due process.”

From FBI boss to death penalty foe

Melinda Burns

After a long career as an FBI boss, having put the Mafia behind bars, investigated dozens of homicides and sent two murderers to their deaths by lethal injection, Tom Parker became a spokesman for death penalty repeal.

Parker, a 72-year-old Santa Barbaran, is seeking the support of law enforcement officials for the Justice That Works Act, a death penalty repeal measure that qualified last month for the November ballot in California.

“There were times during my career when I would gladly have pushed the button on a murderer,” he said. “Today, my position would be, life without parole.”

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Measuring incarceration

Christian Henrichson, The Marshall Project

As the national spotlight burns bright on criminal justice reform, policymakers and the public are closely watching the data for signs that we’ve turned the page on mass incarceration.

Indeed, a recent report from the Brennan Center for Justice noted that 28 states have decreased imprisonment over the last ten years. However, this analysis of state incarceration trends, like every similar one before it, is subject to an important limitation: It excludes individuals in local jails.

One-third of the 2.2 million incarcerated Americans are in jails and, if jail and state trends diverge, the prison numbers alone can give a false picture of a state’s trajectory and make it hard to compare one state with another. As we recently learned, they do diverge—in 16 states.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Inmate fatally stabbed in prison attack in Folsom

Cathy Locke,The Sacramento Bee

An inmate was stabbed to death Thursday afternoon at California State Prison, Sacramento, and prison authorities identified two other inmates as suspects.

Humberto Torres, 33, was killed in C Facility, one of three maximum-security units at the prison in Folsom, according to a California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation news release.

He was stabbed multiple times at 1:30 p.m. and pronounced dead at 1:56 p.m., authorities said. Torres came to the state prison system from Lake County on Jan. 26, 2000, and was serving a 25-year-to-life sentence for second-degree murder with a firearm. He had been an inmate in Folsom since May 27, 2015.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Man Who Hit, Killed Retired Stockton Officer to Be Released After Serving One Year of Sentence

Rowena Shaddox, FOX 40 News

STOCKTON -- The family of retired Stockton police Officer Jimmy Pendergrass learned on Wednesday that the man convicted of striking down and killing the veteran cop of more than 45 years will be a free man next month -- barely serving one year of his four-year prison sentence.

"It's heartbreaking," said Kristina Pendergrass, the victim's daughter-in-law. "What do you think the first thing he's gonna do when he gets out? He's gonna go right to the liquor store, and somebody else's family is gonna suffer."

Is Patty From 'Aquarius' A Real Person? She's Based On A Very Famous Manson Follower

Sage Young, BUSTLE

Charlie has a new girl in his circle in this season of Aquarius, and it didn't take long for Patty to get comfortable with the strange ways of her new friends. In the extra-long Season 2 premiere of the crime drama, a young restaurant employee engages Charlie Manson on the orders of her boss, who wants him and his companions off the premises. Instead, she's drawn into the man's orbit. Patty is ensconced in the Family's commune by her next scene. Her presence on the show has put some historical events into motion. In the Aquarius version of things, Patty introduces Emma and later Charlie to Beach Boys member Dennis Wilson, a brush with fame that indirectly leads to the Cielo Drive and LaBianca murders. The series notoriously throws fictional characters in with portrayals of actual individuals. So, is Patty from Aquarius based on a real person?

The Patty played by Madisen Beaty in Aquarius seems to be a dramatized version of an infamous figure in the bloody legacy of Charles Manson. While some of the women in his company are only credited by first names or nicknames on the show, Patty's full character credit on IMDB is Patricia "Patty" Krenwinkel. Patricia Krenwinkel is very real, and according to The New York Times is still incarcerated in the California Institution for Women for her active role in the Manson Family's killing spree. She has publicly expressed remorse for her crimes, most recently in an interview for the 2014 documentary Life After Manson.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

Mendocino County man trying to prevent sister’s killer from being paroled

Adam Randall, Daily Journal

A Mendocino County man is collecting signatures in hopes of stopping any chance of his sister’s killer from being paroled.

Donald Carl Allen II has been spending time in front of Wal-mart in Ukiah. Other local citizens found out and soon a small volunteer movement joined Allen’s cause.

James Preston Rogers was sentenced to 15 years-to-life in prison in February 2003, for the second-degree murder of his girlfriend, Christine Faye Hilton, 42, who was also Allen’s sister.

Names, crimes of inmates released early a click away in Yolo County

Darrell Smith, The Sacramento Bee

NOTE: The reporter has been informed that the non-violent, second-striker parole process was specifically ordered by federal judges.

A new Yolo County District Attorney’s Office website lists the names of inmates released early on parole, joining Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office in pubicly releasing parolees’ names.

Yolo officials tout the site launched this week as a community service, informing Yolo County residents of designated nonviolent second strike offenders sentenced in Yolo County and released early from California prisons.

Inmates serving time for violent felonies and those registered as sex offenders are not eligible for early parole. Inmates must also have served at least 50 percent of their sentence or be within a year of the 50 percent threshold to be eligible for consideration, said Yolo County DA’s officials.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Mountain View residents protest prison facility

"Would you want your child walking by this place every day?"

Dave Rice, SD Reader

About two dozen community members gathered in Mountain View on Tuesday afternoon (July 5) to protest the presence of a transitional corrections facility run by the for-profit private prison conglomerate Corrections Corporation of America.

"We're trying to get the county to take back the facility and to use it for some community purpose like a recreation center," explained neighborhood resident Michelle Massett. "There are sex offenders in here. There's two churches right next door, often filled with children, women, other community members who feel at risk. Two doors down there's a school. Would you want your child walking by this place every day?"

Fragmented Sentences

Fall ballot initiative could force state to release an additional 25,000 prisoners

Andre Coleman, Pasadena Weekly

In their fight to make the community safer, Pasadena police officers have confiscated 1,300 illegally owned guns off the streets since 2011, according to Pasadena Police Chief Phillip Sanchez.

But now a new ballot measure has Sanchez worried that even more weapons could end up in the hands of felons and undo the work done by police.

The Justice and Rehabilitation Act of 2016 could force the release of thousands of inmates recently reclassified as nonviolent.

OPINION

Alternatives to school suspensions show promise

The San Francisco Chronicle

Berkeley Tech Academy Principal Sheila Quintana had no choice but to suspend 10 students in September after an off-campus brawl was caught on video by neighborhood residents. Another fight among students erupted three days later, leading to three more suspensions.

Quintana knew there had to be a better way to deal with disciplinary process than to shut the students out of school, which can send them into a cycle of futility: falling behind in class and ultimately dropping out with scarce employment opportunities, elevating the risk of a life of crime and incarceration.

There is a better way: It’s a concept known as restorative justice, in which perpetrators of minor to moderate offenses are brought into an intensive program in which they are led to confront the underlying causes and consequences of their actions. They are forced to meet with their victims in sessions known as “the circle” as part of the process of taking responsibility for their actions and repairing the harm they caused.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Lib at Large: Ex-prisoner’s role in Dominican’s ‘Othello’ has parallels to his own tragic past

Paul Liberatore, Marin Independent Journal

“Men in rage strike those that wish them best.”

That line from “Othello” has a tragic resonance for Dameion Brown, a recently released state prison inmate who’s been cast in the title role of the murderous Moorish general in this season’s Marin Shakespeare production at Dominican University.

In Shakespeare’s tragedy, Othello, in a fit of jealousy, strangles his beloved wife, Desdemona, before killing himself. In 1993, Brown was convicted of torturing his then 3-year-old daughter and severely beating three of his other five children. After being locked up for 23 years, he was paroled from Solano State Prison last summer. Through the troubled character he’ll play on stage, Brown has gained insights into the dark parts of himself that plagued him in his troubled past and hurt those closest to him.

Under the effluence

Golf Course Industry

In a case of inadvertent cause and effect, a decrease in water use at a California prison is drastically reducing the supply of irrigation water on a nearby golf course and jeopardizing its future.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

CCI inmates walk for Relay for Life on prison yard

Key Budge, Tehachapi News

Inmates at the California Correctional Institution were asked if they would like to symbolically walk the prison yard at the same time people on the outside walked laps around the track at Coy Burnett Stadium in Tehachapi to support Relay for Life.

A total of 644 inmates said “yes,” and raised $1,053.06 for the fight against cancer.

Warden Kim Holland expressed interest in offering the inmates a chance to participate in Relay for Life as a form of rehabilitation after hearing about it at a CCI Civilian Advisory Committee meeting. She said she wants the inmates to participate in programs that give them a chance to give back to the community.

Intercepted package leads to arrests

Diana Dickinson, The Daily Progress

A package allegedly containing methamphetamine and marijuana was seized from a Tulsa parcel delivery service last week, resulting in three arrests in Rogers County.

Tulsa Police Department (TPD) Corporal Mike Griffin said his narcotics K-9, Jake, was performing drug interdiction work on parcels and had a positive alert on a package headed to Claremore. Griffin obtained a search warrant to open the package and verify its contents.

“The first thing I saw was the marijuana and thought there was more beneath it. But when I looked under it, I was pretty shocked to see a half-pound of meth,” he said.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Jaycee Dugard on Reclaiming Her Life After Being Held Captive for 18 Years: 'I Have Lived a Lot of Lifetimes'

Sean Dooley, Tess Scott, Christina NG and Lauren Effron, NBC News

Looking at Jaycee Dugard today, you would never know that this seemingly carefree woman, laughing and singing along to the car radio, endured nearly two decades of unimaginable horrors.

"I feel like I have lived a lot of lifetimes," Dugard told ABC News' Diane Sawyer in an exclusive television interview.

Dugard was 11 when she was kidnapped by Phillip and Nancy Garrido in 1991 near her Lake Tahoe, California, home. She was held captive for 18 years and gave birth to two daughters, fathered by Phillip Garrido, while she was their prisoner.

Jaycee Dugard reflects on life during and after captivity

ABC 10

For 18 years, she proved to be the ultimate survivor.

Then, at age of 29, Jaycee Dugard walked into a contra costa county investigator's office...she was finally free from years of rape and torture.

Dugard’s new book, “Freedom: My Book of Firsts,” releases Tuesday, July 12. Jaycee sat down with Diane Sawyer for an interview that aired Friday night on ABC10.

Inside ‘The Box’: New Play Explores Life in Solitary

Reese Erlich, KQED

In the play “The Box,” a prisoner offers a soliloquy on why inmates end up in solitary confinement.

“We’re the guys they don’t know how to deal with. We comport ourselves with a little too much dignity. The guards hate that. They put us here to break us down. Guys come in acting tough, can’t bear the pressure. Things get ugly, infractions pile up, which means more time in the hole.”

“The Box,” which opens in San Francisco July 8, starkly portrays the lives of inmates who have violent pasts but demand to be treated as human beings. The play is written by Sarah Shourd, one of the three hikers seized at the Iraq-Iran border and held in a Tehran prison. Shourd spent 410 days in solitary confinement. She was released from Iran in 2010, co-authored a book on her experiences and soon began work on the play.

OPINION

California remains safe as ever

Sal Rodriguez, The OC Register

Violent crime rose 10 percent and property crime rose 8 percent across California last year, according to a report by the state’s attorney general. Though significant, such an increase actually tells us little about what caused it, and even less about what to do about it.

We have seen significant increases in crime before. In 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered California to reduce its prison population, citing concerns with overcrowding. The state responded with Assembly Bill 109, known as “realignment,” which shifted responsibility for non-violent, non-serious, non-sexual offenders to the county level.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Inmates walks away from Baseline Conservation Camp

ABC10

Officials with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) are looking for a minimum-security inmate who walked away from the Baseline Conservation Camp, located near the community of Jamestown, in Tuolumne County.

Inmate Daniel Perez, 34, was last seen in his assigned dorm on Sunday, July 10, 2016, at approximately 10:30 p.m. during a routine security check. Camp staff searched the inmate dormitory area, surrounding buildings and the camp perimeter after it was revealed he was missing. All local law enforcement agencies and the California Highway Patrol have been notified and are assisting in the search for Perez. Apprehension efforts are continuing.

Inmate killed during fight at Southern California prison

The Associated Press

California state corrections officials are investigating the slaying of an inmate during a fight between nearly two dozen inmates at the Calipatria State Prison in Imperial County.

Officials said Monday that the 54-year-old inmate was stabbed repeatedly in the abdomen, chest, head and back by two other inmates Sunday morning

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

Suspect in San Diego homeless killings had violent history

Elliot Spagat and Julie Watson, The Associated Press

A man accused of a spate of deadly attacks on San Diego homeless men who were asleep and in some cases set on fire committed a nearly identical crime six years ago.

Anthony Alexander Padgett, 36, now jailed on suspicion of murder, admitted lighting a sleeping man on fire in a supermarket parking lot in January 2010 in the San Diego suburb of National City.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Tulare County jail population among highest in state

Sheyanne Romero, Visalia Times Delta

Within a month of breaking ground on Tulare County’s South Valley Detention Facility, a study showed Tulare County as having one of the highest jail populations in California.

The Vera Institute of Justice started The Incarceration Trends Project last year in an effort to advance research and help guide change by providing easily accessible information on the number of people in jail and prison for every county in the nation.

OPINION

Feel safer? Easier to get parole, harder to buy bullets

Debra J. Saunders, SFGate

Gov. Jerry Brown and the Democratic Legislature have a unique plan to enhance public safety in California. They have reduced the state prison population from close to 150,000 in 2010 to 113,000 now by downgrading what crimes put an offender in prison. Now they are pushing a ballot measure that would enable repeat serious and violent offenders to qualify for early release — to further reduce the state prison population. No worries, though, because they also are passing laws that make it harder or costlier for everyone to buy guns and ammunition.

This month, Brown actually vetoed a bipartisan measure to make stealing a gun a felony. In his veto message, Brown wrote that Assembly Bill 1176 was “nearly identical” to a provision in a gun-control ballot measure championed by Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom. “While I appreciate the authors’ intent in striving to enhance public safety, I feel that the objective is better attained by having the measure appear before the voters only once.” Imagine the outcry if a Republican had vetoed that bill for such bald partisan reasons.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Riding to Folsom with a bishop

R.W Dellinger, Angelus News

Saturday, June 25, 1:29 a.m. The white chartered bus with dark trim around its tinted windows pulls into Holy Family’s parking lot in South Pasadena. A good hour late. Some 15 women, including more than a few grandmothers, are out here in front of the youth center with kids in tow.

So are four folks wearing purple T-shirts embossed with “Get On The Bus” white logos. And so is Auxiliary Bishop David O’Connell of the San Gabriel Region. He’s going along on the 400-mile ride to Folsom State Prison and nearby California State Prison, Sacramento, too.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Fresno Bee exclusive: Chowchilla kidnappers talk about life after prison

The Fresno Bee

As the 40th anniversary of the Chowchilla bus kidnapping nears, two of the three kidnappers are out of prison and leading quiet lives in the Bay Area. The third kidnapper remains in prison.

Brothers Richard and James Schoenfeld and Fred Woods commandeered a Dairyland Elementary school bus on July 15, 1976, holding 26 children and bus driver Ed Ray captive for 16 hours before they broke out of a van buried in a Livermore quarry.

The 40th anniversary of the notorious kidnapping is Friday, but the Schoenfelds have given no media interviews. They spoke only reluctantly to a friend about their lives today and agreed to have the limited comments shared in The Bee.

SCC Baseline Camp inmate remains at large

Tori James, Mother Lode News

Jamestown, CA — An inmate who walked away sometime after a late-night security check is still on the lam, according to Sierra Conservation Center Baseline Camp officials.

Last seen in his dorm Sunday evening 34-year-old Daniel Perez was described by SCC officials as a minimum security inmate who, serving a 12-year sentence for burglary, was scheduled to be released in November 2019.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

Woman fights for right for family to attend parole hearing of sister’s killer

Joe Khalil, Fox News

One day before their loved one's killer comes up for parole, a local family is putting up a fight against the state's parole board, claiming the board is violating laws that should protect victims’ families.

It’s been nearly 40 years since Nina Salarno's sister Catina was brutally murdered by her ex-boyfriend on her first day of college at the University of the Pacific. The tragedy left her dark memories she says still haven't gone away.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Sacramento man shot by police identified as review continues

Don Thompson and Darcy Costello, The Associated Press

Two Sacramento police officers appear to have been following department protocol when they killed a man who was waving a knife on a city street, a department spokesman said Tuesday.

The coroner's office identified the man killed as Joseph Mann, 50.

PROP 57: Jerry Brown’s early release for violent offenders

By Jon Fleischman, The Ceres Courier

Just a week ago, California Attorney General Kamala Harris released an alarming report detailing how violent crime in California is on the rise, increasing 10 percent over the last year.

Violent crimes were up last year by about 15,000 to a high of 166,588. Homicides went up 9.7 percent, robberies 8.5 percent, aggravated assaults 8 percent. Rapes increased 36 percent!

Kevin Faulconer to help lead opposition to Brown’s parole measure

Christopher Cadelago, The Sacramento Bee

San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer will announce Wednesday that he plans to help lead the opposition to Gov. Jerry Brown’s statewide fall ballot initiative to make some felons eligible for early parole.

Faulconer, among the state’s most prominent Republicans, is scheduled to appear with a trio of county prosecutors and victims’ rights advocate Marc Klaas at an 11 a.m. event in San Diego.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

Parole denied for man who sparked California victim's group

Don Thompson, The Associated Press

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) —California parole officials on Wednesday rejected the release of a killer whose crime led to the creation of one of the state's best-known crime victims' groups.

Harriet Salarno founded Crime Victims United of California after her 18-year-old daughter was fatally shot by her former boyfriend on her first day at the University of the Pacific in Stockton in 1979.

San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer takes on Gov. Jerry Brown's parole ballot measure

John Myers, The Los Angeles Times

Kevin Faulconer, who tamped down talk of a 2018 bid for governor during his successful reelection as mayor of San Diego, will lead the charge against the effort to revamp prison parole laws by Gov. Jerry Brown.

Faulconer appeared with prosecutors and victim rights advocates at a San Diego news conference on Wednesday morning to launch the campaign against Proposition 57.

CALIFORNIA REALIGNMENT

Slowly, SJ recidivism numbers coming down as fewer reoffend

Wes Bowers, Record

STOCKTON — The number of offenders convicted after being released from jail last year is slightly down from previous years, and San Joaquin County officials and leaders say that’s a positive trend for state-mandated realignment in public safety.

San Joaquin County Chief Probation Officer Stephanie James presented an annual recidivism report to the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday. It is the fourth report the Probation Department has presented to supervisors since the passage of Assembly Bill 109, California’s Public Safety Realignment Act.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

San Quentin prevails in legal appeal by murderer accused of cheating on essay test

Gary Klien, Marin Independent Journal

The questions surrounding Nathan Hall’s final exam for Feather River College have been settled to the satisfaction of some of California’s ranking jurists.

The dispute developed while Hall, a convicted murderer, was serving time at San Quentin State Prison. In recent years he took a correspondence course in English offered at the prison through the community college, which is in Plumas County.

CCI inmates walk for Relay for Life on prison yard

Key Budge, Tehachapi News

A total of 644 inmates said “yes,” and raised $1,053.06 for the fight against cancer.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

From Paris to Sacramento, parkour offers physical, mental conditioning

Jessica Hice, The Sacramento Bee

During work hours, Bryan Jenks earns his living as a technician in the health care department at Mule Creek State Prison in Ione. Off the clock, the tall, tattooed 23-year-old runs through fields, jumps over metal railings and scales brick walls around the Sacramento region, all for fun and exercise.

Just don’t call him Spiderman. He’s a local champion of parkour, a training and movement discipline that aficionados use to move in the most efficient way possible through a variety of landscapes, without the help of equipment such as ropes and ladders.

Court overturns death sentence in San Joaquin County slaying

The Associated Press

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - The California Supreme Court has overturned the death sentence of a man convicted of murdering the son of a liquor store owner during a robbery.

The court in a unanimous decision said Monday that a San Joaquin County judge wrongly dismissed a prospective juror in Louis Zaragoza’s trial. Though the juror opposed the death penalty, the court said she showed she could set aside her views on capital punishment when determining a sentence.

OPINION

Should felons be allowed to vote from behind bars?

Patrick McGreevy, The Los Angeles Times

Thousands of felons serving time in county jails would be allowed to vote in California elections from behind bars under a bill moving swiftly through the state Legislature despite widespread opposition from law enforcement officials.

Assemblywoman Shirley Weber (D-San Diego) introduced the measure with an aim that providing convicts the right to vote will give them a better sense of belonging to society and possibly reduce their chances of committing new crimes when released.

“Civic participation can be a critical component of re-entry and has been linked to reduced recidivism,” Weber told her colleagues during a recent heated floor debate on the bill.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Inmate in fatal 210 Fwy DUI crash raising money for victim’s family

Miriam Hernandez, KABC

A Los Angeles County inmate who killed a man while driving drunk on the 210 Freeway in Azusa is attempting to right his wrong by helping to raise money for the victim's family.

Justin Romo, 19, was killed when Tyler Thompson drove the wrong way down the 210 Freeway in the early morning hours of Aug. 9, 2014.

Tyler Thompson, now 26, originally pleaded not guilty to the felony charge, but later pleaded no contest and apologized to Romo's family in court.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

AM Alert: California Association of Psychiatric Technicians protests forced overtime at Department of State Hospitals in Stockton

Anshu Siripurapu, Sacramento Bee

Members of the California Association of Psychiatric Technicians who work at the Department of State Hospitals in Stockton are holding an “informational picket and rally” to protest what they believe is an unsafe use of overtime by the hospital.

The hospital treats inmates in California prisons who have major mental illnesses that prevent them from being in the general prison population. Psychiatric technicians provide hands-on care to the patient-inmates.

“We’re exhausted. It’s tiring. 16 hours is a lot to work in a day,” Jamila O’Neal, a technician at the hospital and the president of CAPT’s Stockton chapter said Thursday, “A lot of us have families to go home to and they’re suffering.”

DEATH PENALTY

Effort launched to end death penalty in CA

Miriam Hernandez, KABC

A renewed debate on the death penalty kicked off Thursday as anti-execution advocates announced their campaign for Proposition 62.

The core issue is how to punish the "worst of the worst." The measure abolishes the death penalty in California, and instead makes the maximum penalty for murder life in prison without possibility of parole.

It would also apply to those already sentenced to death row.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Health clinics going up at Corcoran prison in building boom

Lewis Griswold, The Fresno Bee

Corcoran- A building boom behind the walls of Corcoran state prison is putting the state on the right side of a federal receiver and boosting the local economy.

At the prison, which holds about 3,570 inmates, work has begun on new health clinics to comply with a 2002 settlement in federal court requiring a higher level of medical care for inmates at all state prisons.

As a result, construction projects are occurring at 31 of the 34 state prisons.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

Mendocino County murderer denied parole

Adam Randall, Daily Journal

Convicted Mendocino County murderer Michael Charles Camou was denied parole for another three years earlier this month, according to California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation records.

Camou entered a stipulation for his parole hearing scheduled on July 6. California Code of Regulations allows prisoners to declare themselves unsuitable for parole.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Instigator of California meat-cleaver murder gets six years in prison

Steve Gorman, REUTERS

A former Swiss university professor who pleaded guilty to instigating the 1995 meat-cleaver murder of a man who she claimed raped her while she was a college student in California was sentenced on Friday to six years in prison.

Norma Esparza, 41, whose 2012 arrest in the long-unsolved case made international headlines, was sentenced along with two co-defendants for their roles in the slaying of 24-year-old Gonzalo Ramirez more than 20 years ago in Irvine, California.

Florida parole board sets path to freedom for prison Houdini

The Associated Press

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) -- A man called the "prison Houdini" has a path to freedom after Florida's parole commission voted to release him this month, 36 years after he was arrested for stealing the tools his father bequeathed to him.

Mark DeFriest didn't wait for his father's will to be executed before taking the tools and was convicted of burglary. Decades were added to the sentence after several

DEATH PENALTY

California bishops urge voters to reject the death penalty this fall

CAN

Los Angeles, Calif., Jul 16, 2016 / 02:09 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- On Thursday, the bishops of California announced their support of a state ballot measure that would end the use of capital punishment in the state, replacing it with life in prison without possibility of parole.

“Our commitment to halt the practice of capital punishment is rooted both in the Catholic faith and our pastoral experience,” the bishops said in their July 14 statement in support of Proposition 62.

OPINION

Is rape a violent crime? AG Kamala Harris offers two definitions

Dan Walters, The Sacramento Bee

Attorney General Kamala Harris recently released her annual report on crime, revealing that in 2015, violent crimes jumped 10 percent from the previous year.

Among the four violent crimes listed, the 36.1 percent increase in rape was the most startling. It revealed that 12,793 persons – virtually all women – were rape victims last year.

Within that sickening statistic lies a bothersome political tale.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Inmate at North Kern prison has died

Theo Douglas, Bakersfield.com

An inmate at North Kern State Prison died last week, the Kern County Coroner’s Office said in a news release on Monday.

Inmate Eddie Lee Chapman of Delano was found unresponsive in his jail cell at 7:51 a.m. July 12 and was pronounced dead two minutes later, according to KCCO.

He was 43 and his next of kin has been notified. Prison officials declined to discuss Chapman’s death because it is under investigation by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Inmate Who Walked Away From Baseline Conservation Camp Near Jamestown Apprehended

Sierra Sun Times

July 19, 2016 - Los Angeles, CA – California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) special agents apprehended inmate Daniel Perez, 34, Monday morning, approximately eight days after he was discovered missing from the minimum security Baseline Conservation Camp in Jamestown, Tuolumne County.

Perez, 34, was taken into custody at 11:30 am in Rosemead, Los Angeles County, by CDCR Special Service Units without incident. Perez walked away from Baseline camp sometime after a routine security check at 10:30 pm, Sunday July 10, 2016.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

Elderly Parole Program Could Shorten Kidnapper’s Prison Sentence By 400 Years

Shirin Rajaee, CBS

EL DORADO COUNTY (CBS13) – Seven years after Jaycee Dugard was rescued from the hands of a convicted sex offender, Phillip Garrido is now eligible for release some 400 years early.

“He went and abducted an 11-year-old and held her in captivity for many years, we shouldn’t even be talking about the potential for release for him,” says Vern Pierson, El Dorado County’s District Attorney.

DEATH PENALTY

California bishops back initiative to abolish death penalty

Catholic Herald

The bishops released a statement to coincide with the launch of the Yes on 62 campaign

The California Catholic bishops announced their support last week for Proposition 62, a voter initiative on the November ballot that would repeal the death penalty.

The bishops timed their statement to coincide with the launch of the Yes on 62 campaign that took place at a Los Angeles news conference. Speakers there included former death penalty advocates, victims’ families, law enforcement officials, faith leaders and wrongfully convicted former death-row prisoners.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

CCA Awarded Contract for Residential Reentry Services by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation

Nasdaq

NASHVILLE, Tenn., July 18, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- CCA (NYSE:CXW) (the "Company" or "Corrections Corporation of America"), America's largest owner of partnership correctional, detention, and reentry facilities, announced today that it received an award from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to house up to 120 residents as part of The Male Community Reentry Program (MCRP) at CCA's 120-bed CAI-Boston Avenue residential reentry facility in San Diego, California.

The MCRP was designed by the CDCR to provide a range of community-based, rehabilitative services that assist with substance use disorders, mental health care, medical care, employment, education, housing, family reunification and social support to help participants successfully reenter the community and reduce recidivism.

Yoga changing lives one pose at a time

Rosemary Ponnekanti, The News Tribune

ACOMA, Wash. – It’s not your typical yoga class. There are no chic leggings, no feel-good decorations. Instead, there are gray lockers, institutional carpet, a noisy fan.

Oh, and a locked door with a guard behind it.

But while the women reaching into mountain pose are wearing state-issued gray sweats, their faces radiate peace. It’s a class at the Washington Corrections Center for Women in Purdy, Wash., taught by Yoga Behind Bars, a Seattle-based nonprofit.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

Chowchilla kidnapping 40 years ago not forgotten

Rory Appleton, Chowchilla News

CHOWCHILLA — For 40 years, strangers from around the world have asked Jennifer Brown Hyde about her kidnapping.

“People find out and are fascinated,” Hyde said. “And that’s fine. I don’t mind sharing it because the world stopped and was on its knees praying for us. And I feel, 40 years later, that I owe it to those people to share where I am at in life.”

Hyde was one of 26 children abducted July 15, 1976, during a summer school bus ride in Chowchilla. The students and their bus driver were taken at gunpoint and eventually were piled into a moving van and buried in a Bay Area quarry. They escaped without any physical injuries after less than a day in captivity.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Why Are So Many Inmates Attempting Suicide at the California Institution for Women?

Hillel Aron, LA Weekly

Erika Rocha spent her 35th birthday— her last birthday — at California Institution for Women (CIW), the smaller of the state's two female-only prisons. In the yard of the Chino Valley facility, about an hour east of downtown L.A., her friends threw her a Tinker Bell party.

"For two weeks Erika was asking what kind of party she was having," one of her friends, nicknamed Grumpy, would later write in a booklet distributed at Rocha's memorial service. "Everyone kept telling her, 'You're just having a private little dinner with your honey.' She came up to [another friend] Dreamer and was all, 'I know you can't hold water, so what are you guys doing for my B-Day?' [Dreamer] can't keep those kinds of secrets so [she] just smiled and was like, 'You're having a little dinner like you wanted.'"

DEATH PENALTY

Silicon Valley’s Powerful Steer Cash to Death Penalty Repeal Bid

Alison Vekshin, Bloomberg

Some of Silicon Valley’s biggest names are pouring money into an effort to overturn California’s death penalty as support for capital punishment has declined to the lowest in decades.

Reed Hastings, the billionaire chief executive officer of Netflix Inc., donated $1 million, and Salesforce.com Inc. CEO Marc Benioff gave $50,000 to support a measure on the November ballot that would replace death with a life sentence without parole. Seven wealthy donors from technology companies have contributed the bulk of the $4 million raised so far.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Jerry Brown, unions remain embroiled in negotiations

Rachel Cohrs, The Sacramento Bee

Between June 1 and July 2, 15 state employee bargaining units’ contracts expired. So far, only one of them has come to an agreement with the governor.

This round of negotiations is particularly sticky because California Gov. Jerry Brown is trying to chip away at nearly $72 billion in retiree health benefit obligations over the next 30 years by getting state employees to contribute from their paychecks. With certain units, that strategy hasn’t gone over smoothly.

International Union of Operating Engineers representative Steve Crouch said while the union agrees with the concept of pre-funding retiree benefits, it disagrees with the amount of money that should be taken out of workers’ paychecks.

Ex-con TV host keynotes CMCC precision machine conference

Kathryn Skelton, Lewiston Sun Journal

AUBURN — After a rough start and years in federal prison, Titan Gilroy took an entry-level job at a machine shop and learned the trade — then built his own company.

With a few smart moves, it took off like a shot.

"I went from $1 million (the first year) to $1 million a month for the next 24 months — 55 employees, 20 Haas (high-tech) machines," Gilroy said.

Santa Barbara County Jail Project Awaits State Approval

Correctional News

SANTA MARIA, Calif. — Now that the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors awarded construction contracts in early July for the Northern Branch jail in Santa Maria, final state approval is required before continuing with plans to build the facility. That includes review by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR), State Public Works Board and Pooled Money Investment Board.

The $77.7 million construction bid package was awarded to Costa Mesa, Calif.-based SJ Amoroso Construction Inc., and locally based Spiess Construction Co. Inc. was awarded the $2.9 million bid package for off-site utility and road improvement work, according to Noozhawk.

OPINION

Proposition 62 can mark the progress of a maturing society for conscientious Californians

The Turlock Journal

Forty-five years ago in a bone-chilling, blood-curdling cover story for The Los Angeles Free Press about California’s gas chamber (“How Long Can You Hold Your Breath?,” December 4, 1970), author, musician, and beatnik activist Ed Sanders, decried state-sponsored, tax-payer funded executions as a “ritual of filth.” Sanders exhorted: “Isn’t it time to crush that cruel nose-cone at San Quentin in the jaws of the nearest auto compactor or in the nearest junk yard?”

Close to half a century later – but, better late than never – when Californians head to the polls on November 8, 2016, we can do just what Ed Sanders suggested: We can toss out what former Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun called our broken and vile “machinery of death,” relegating it to the dust-heap of our shared, dark, wayward humanity.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Inmates At Donovan State Prison Eligible For Federal College Funds

Megan Burks, KPBS News

Southwestern College in Chula Vista will begin offering the federal Pell Grants in the fall to Donovan prisoners as part of a pilot program started by the Obama administration.

About two dozen inmates at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in Otay Mesa will receive federal Pell Grants and classes in business administration in the fall.

Pell Grants have been off limits to prisoners since 1994, when Congress enacted a ban on financial aid for inmates as part of several tough-on-crime policies. Last year, President Barack Obama superseded the ban with a temporary pilot program to offer the grants to about 12,000 inmates. Under the Higher Education Act, the secretary of education can waive such restrictions to conduct pilots.

Crime Q&A: What was sentence in 2014 gang-related shooting on Fruitridge Road?

Cathy Locke, The Sacramento Bee

Q: Has Christopher Schulz been sentenced for a 2014 shooting on Fruitridge Road?

Rick, Sacramento

A: Christopher Schulz, 25, was convicted in May of assault with a semiautomatic firearm, discharging a firearm at an occupied vehicle and being a felon in possession of a firearm.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Grassroots Prisoner Reentry Programs Show Progress

Rex Dalton, Voice of OC

Weekly through the winter in Santa Ana, a group of about 20 young men and women would meet in a circle to share their experiences about leadership.

The lessons they learned, however, weren’t from traditional sources but from the mean streets of Orange County or the corridors of California prisons.

The group was a mix -- some who had spent a short time incarcerated, but turned their lives around, and others who spent decades behind bars.

In June, they graduated from the community leadership program created by Project Kinship, a small Santa Ana-based non-profit organization that helps the formerly incarcerated successfully reenter the community.

DEATH PENALTY

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom endorses proposition to abolish the death penalty in California

The Los Angeles Times

California Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom on Tuesday threw his support behind a ballot measure that would repeal the death penalty in California, saying the criminal justice policy did not deter crime and was fundamentally immoral.

In a statement, he said Proposition 62 would abolish a system "that is administered with troubling racial disparities." Newsom, who publicly supported a 2012 failed measure seeking to end capital punishment, said the initiative would also save the state millions of dollars. He cited statistics showing that California has spent $5 billion to execute 13 people since 1978.

‘Do they deserve death?’: Diverse coalition kicks off ‘Yes-on-62’ campaign

R.W. Dellinger, Angelus

“In 1978, my dad and I worked very hard to pass the Briggs initiative, which is today’s death penalty law here in California,” his son Ron Briggs, then a supervisor in El Dorado County, declared at an outdoor press conference at Grand Park near Downtown L.A. on July 14.

“We thought back then that we would deliver swift justice, that we would take care of the victims’ families and survivors and provide them closure. We thought we would save California money. We believed then a broad death penalty would act as a deterrent to crime,” Briggs explained.

“We couldn’t have been more wrong,” he said. “What we did is we created an ‘industry of death’ in California, costing tax payers $187 million a year. We have spent over $5 billion in California since 1978 doing 13 executions. That’s a staggering $384 million per execution.”

OPINION

California’s broken death penalty system can be fixed

The Sacramento Bee

In 1978, California enacted today’s California death penalty statute, the so-called Briggs Initiative. Now, Ron Briggs supports repealing the statute his “family wrote,” but his argument reads more like a surrender to death penalty abolitionists (“Death penalty is destructive to California”; Forum, July 10).

Instead of waving a white flag, Briggs should endorse Proposition 66, the Death Penalty Reform and Savings Act of 2016, as a worthy successor to his family’s work. This initiative deals with the concerns Briggs raises about California’s death penalty system.

CDCR NEWS

Operation Heat targets fugitives, arrests 7 parolees in Fresno sweep

Cresencio Rodriguez-Delgado, The Fresno Bee

Guns and ammunition were among the items confiscated during an operation targeting at-large parolees in Fresno on Thursday, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said.

Seven parolees, four of whom were fugitives, were also taken off the streets during Operation Heat. Special parole agents from Fresno and Tulare counties joined the Fresno Police Department in the sweep administered by the CDCR.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Youth program changing lives in San Quentin

Allison Weeks and Alecia Reid, KRON

SAN RAFAEL (KRON)—A youth program inside San Quentin State Prison is changing lives.

It’s giving some inmates a new lease on life.

KRON4’s Alecia Reid went behind the prison walls for a closer look at their rehabilitation.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

Man Convicted Of Attempting To Murder Judge Denied Parole

Your Central Valley

A 70-year-old Visalia man who is in prison for attempting to murder a judge 25 years ago has been denied parole.

According to a statement released by the Tulare County District Attorney's Office, Harry Bodine's parole request was denied by the parole board on Wednesday, at the San Quentin State Prison, for the fifth time.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Fresno man resentenced to 80 years to life in prison for killing pregnant woman in 2006

Pablo Lopez, The Fresno Bee

A Fresno man initially sentenced to life in prison without parole was resentenced Thursday to 80 years to life in prison in connection with the 2006 killing of a pregnant woman and her unborn child.

Jose Angel Perez accepted his new punishment in Fresno County Superior Court, hoping that an appellate court will reduce his sentence under a new California law that gives youthful offenders a chance at parole after serving 25 years in prison, said Fresno defense attorney Peter Jones, who represents Perez.

California man on trial for 2011 home invasion, robbery of Kennewick jewelry store

Kristin M. Kraemer, Tri City Herald

A California man on trial for the 2011 home invasion and kidnapping of a Kennewick jeweler’s family said Thursday that investigators made a mistake.

Vicente Guizar Figueroa, 21, denied knowing anything about a plan five years ago to hold the family of Mark Welsh hostage while the robbers took the Touchstone Jewelers owner to his store so they could steal $500,000 in merchandise.

Figueroa testified that he’s only been to the Tri-Cities twice in his life, while visiting his mother in Yakima County. Those occasions were just to go to the mall, he said.

REALIGNMENT

Public Defender Seeking Social Workers to Help With Prisoner Reentry

Rex Dalton, Voice of OC

In a new way to assist clients, the Orange County Public Defender's Office is planning to hire social workers to help people reenter the community after criminal offenses.

The agency hopes to hire four social workers to assist public defenders in integrating clients back into the community -- as a part of California’s broader effort to help offenders lead productive lives and save taxpayer dollars.

A proposal for one year of funding totaling nearly $330,000 is to go to the county Board of Supervisors by autumn.

OPINION

Poll: Don’t repeal California’s death penalty

Argus Courier

A majority of respondents to a recent Argus-Courier online poll said they would not vote to repeal the death penalty in California, when the question comes up on the November ballot. About two-thirds of respondents said they would vote “no” on the measure, while one-third said they would vote to end the death penalty.

Here are some comments:

“Absolutely not. If an individual is convicted of murder, they deserve the death penalty. Our tax dollars should not be spent taking care of these people while they sit comfortably in prison getting free health care and other ridiculous rights. Get rid of them.”

CDCR NEWS

Governor Brown Announces Appointments

Imperial Valley News

Sacramento, California - Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. today announced the following appointments:

Rosemary Ndoh, 54, of Hanford, has been appointed warden at Avenal State Prison, where she has been acting warden since 2015 and has served in several positions since 2002, including chief deputy warden, associate warden and supervisor of the correctional education program. She was supervisor of academic instruction at the California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility and State Prison, Corcoran from 1997 to 2002 and a teacher at California State Prison, Centinela from 1993 to 1997. Ndoh earned a Master of Arts degree in education from San Diego State University. This position does not require Senate confirmation and the compensation is $148,040. Ndoh is registered without party preference.

CALIFORNIA PAROLE

California governor rejects parole for ex-Manson family member

Madison Park, CNN

(CNN)California Gov. Jerry Brown denied parole to former Manson family member Leslie Van Houten, saying that the murder convict "currently poses an unreasonable danger to society."

Earlier this year, the Board of Parole Hearings had recommended her release.

Van Houten and other followers of Charles Manson were convicted for the 1969 murders of supermarket executive Leno LaBianca and his wife, Rosemary.

In 1994, Van Houten described her part in the killings in a prison interview with CNN's Larry King.

California governor denies parole for Manson follower

Jonathan J. Cooper, The Associated Press

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) -- Leslie Van Houten, the youngest member of the Manson "family" to take part in a series of gruesome California murders in 1969, has been denied freedom again - her past overshadowing her decades as a model prisoner.

California Gov. Jerry Brown on Friday overturned a parole board recommendation in April that found Van Houten, 66, was no longer the violent woman who helped slaughter a wealthy grocer and his wife.

Woman Convicted Of Manslaughter Denied Parole

Sentinel

A 64-year-old former Los Gatos woman was denied parole again Thursday in a 1997 fatal DUI crash on Summit Road in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

March 18, 1997, Deborah Lynn Thompson drove a 1985 Ford Thunderbird east on Summit Road near Highway 17 when she swerved, hit a fence and tree and rolled the car, prosecutors said. Her 42-year-old passenger, Edward Lee Traster, was killed in the crash.

REALIGNMENT

Local re-entry program shows promise for inmates

Kate Morrissey, The San Diego Union-Tribune

People serving sentences for nonviolent felonies in San Diego County custody recommit crimes less frequently than those who serve in state prison for similar crimes, according to new data from the San Diego County probation department.

Before the 2011 state realignment shifting more nonviolent inmates to county facilities, people returning to San Diego County from state prison went back to prison at a higher rate than for California as a whole, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

Inmate Remains At Large After Escaping From Los Angeles Re-Entry Facility

CBS

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Authorities are still searching for an inmate who escaped from a male community re-entry program (MCRP) facility in Los Angeles.

Jory M. Mixon, 29, walked away from the MCRP on Saturday.

The LA County facility is located at 6th and Alvarado in the Rampart area.

Staff at the facility were notified that Mixon’s GPS device had been manipulated, and when they initiated an emergency count and search, they discovered the device had been discarded and that Mixon was missing.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

PRISONS: Lake Elsinore man who hid girlfriend's body in suitcase is suspect in cellmate's slaying

Brian Rokos, Press-Enterprise

Joseph David Dorsey, the Lake Elsinore man who was convicted in 2013 of killing his girlfriend and stuffing her body in a suitcase, was named as a suspect in the slaying of his cellmate at Kern Valley State Prison in Delano.

Jason M. Christner, 39, was found unresponsive in his cell about 8 p.m. on Thursday, July 21, according to a news release from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Christner was pronounced dead less than a half hour later.

California inmate's death being investigated as homicide

The Associated Press

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — The California corrections department says an inmate's death is being investigated as a homicide.

Guards at Kern Valley State Prison in Delano found 39-year-old Jason Christner unresponsive in his cell Thursday night. They were unable to revive him.

It's the fifth suspected homicide since November at the prison north of Bakersfield. Officials don't believe they're related.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Sacramento Report: The San Diego Split Over Prop. 57

Sara Libby and Kelly Davis, Voice of San Diego

A November ballot measure is putting San Diego’s mayor and district attorney — both Republicans and frequent allies — at odds.

Last week, Mayor Kevin Faulconer announced he will lead the statewide campaign to oppose the Public Safety and Rehabilitation Act of 2016, or Prop. 57. Also last week, San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis, currently the only district attorney in California who supports the measure, was in Sacramento, meeting with the secretary of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation about how to address issues raised by Prop. 57’s opponents.

Ballot measure opposed by local law enforcement leaders would change sentencing statewide

Sean Longoria, Redding Record Searchlight

An initiative on the November statewide ballot would make sweeping changes to California prison sentencing, give judges more authority in whether juveniles are tried as adults and possibly release more prison inmates to counties.

The authors of Proposition 57 contend the measure, if approved by voters, would reduce wasteful state prison spending, emphasize rehabilitation by expanding credits for good behavior and education, and prevent federal courts from indiscriminately releasing prisoners.

Dismembered hawk, more seized after Salinas traffic stop

Chelcey Adami, The Salinas Californian

Authorities seized a gun, loaded magazine, methamphetamine, cocaine, a stolen prison ballistics vest and a dismembered hawk Friday from a Salinas man who was out on bail for another arrest related to firearms and narcotics last month.

Raul Gonzalo Tapia, 38, a convicted felon, was arrested in June following a traffic stop during which police found three ounces of methamphetamine and more than $3,000 in Tapia’s pocket. Police then reportedly found firearms, six grams of base cocaine and 44 grams of methamphetamine while serving a search warrant at his home on Riker Street.

CALIFORNIA INMATES

San Quentin Prison Report: Supporting breast cancer awareness from inside

KALW

For the past six years, inmates and staff at San Quentin State Prison have raised $40,000 for the Avon Breast Cancer Foundation by holding walkathons inside the prison gates. SQPR reporter Earlonne Woods tells us why they walk.

Gang feud blamed for 2013 freeway killing; 3 arrested

Lyndsay Winkley, The San Diego Union-Tribune

LA MESA — For years after his first born son was slain in a drive-by shooting on a La Mesa freeway, Xusha Brown spent sleepless nights agonizing over whether his son's killer would be brought to justice.

With help from his tribe, the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation, and law enforcement, Brown and family members put together a $100,000 reward for information. Freeway signs were erected in his son’s memory, but the case remained unsolved. It was hard to remain hopeful, he said.

Raging Sand Fire displaces dozens of exotic animals from Southern California wildlife sanctuary

Fox News

Firefighters have been working tirelessly since Friday, July 22, to contain the Sand Fire raging near Santa Clarita, California.

The fire has burned more than 30,000 acres and is at 10 percent containment. At least 18 homes have been destroyed, officials said, and evacuations are still in place.

Thousands of other structures were in jeopardy, including Wildlife Waystation, an animal refuge in Angeles National Forest.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Where did California’s savings from reducing drug penalties go?

Rachel Cohrs, The Sacramento Bee

Nearly 20 ex-convicts who had been drug addicts, gangbangers and prostitutes strained their eyes in an attempt to grasp the colorful, intricate diagram scribbled on the whiteboard.

On a Sunday afternoon in Oakland, the group gathered with community organizers to discuss mass incarceration in a small, fluorescent-lit office tucked in a strip mall.

Brandon Sturdivant, an advocate with the faith-based network Oakland Community Organizations, pointed at the board that described the impacts of Proposition 47. Specifically, he singled out one number: $67 million.

Pokémon Go takes players to sex offender residences

Matthias Gafni, East Bay Times

As stories multiply about Pokémon-related robberies, engrossed gamers walking off cliffs and morbid discoveries, parents and law enforcement have begun to pay more attention to potential pitfalls of the wildly popular Pokémon Go. The Bay Area News Group decided to explore one such danger zone using the Megan's Law sex offender database.

BANG recently sent out a team of reporters armed with the Pokémon Go app to a random selection of sex offenders' residences in various cities -- as registered on the publicly accessible Megan's Law website -- to find out just how close the players get.

Sexually Violent Predator Living As Transient In Solano County Blocked From Moving To Marysville

CBS

SOLANO COUNTY (CBS13) – A sexually violent predator looking to move to Marysville will have to stay in Solano County.

Today in court, Fraisure Smith was ordered to continue his search for suitable housing in the area.

Smith was released from a state hospital and has been moving from motel to motel, looking for a permanent residence, which was ordered by a judge. Smith is to temporarily stay at hotels and motels around Solano County.

Berkeley City Council approves resolution to divest from private prisons

Kailey Martinez-Ramage, The Daily California

Berkeley City Council voted July 19 to adopt a resolution calling on the city to divest from private prisons and to send a letter to the city’s business partners requesting them to do the same.

During City Council’s regular meeting, a resolution proposed by Councilmember Kriss Worthington was passed to appeal to the city of Berkeley to divest from the private prison industry. According to Worthington, the resolution would first require the city’s finance department to evaluate the potential consequences on Berkeley’s economy from divesting in private prisons before acting.

OPINION

Gov. Jerry Brown’s initiative would free more convicts: Thomas Elias

Thomas D. Elias, Los Angeles Daily News

For years, Gov. Jerry Brown could hide behind the fig leaf of a federal court order in turning tens of thousands of convicts loose in a program he called “prison realignment.”

Prisons lost almost one-third of their occupants to county jails and streets all around the state. Most of those released or paroled were so-called “minor” criminals; very few rapists, murderers or armed robbers have won early releases.

CALIFORNIA PRISONS

Lancaster Prison Provides Refuge for Deaf Dogs Fleeing Sand Fire

The Los Angeles Times

A Lancaster prison is providing shelter for rescue animals as the Sand fire continues to burn in the Santa Clarita Valley.

The State Prison-Los Angeles County is watching over nearly 50 deaf dogs from the Deaf Dog Rescue of America in Acton, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

The rescue said it struggled to find a place that would be able to accept all of the dogs, which are now being cared for by inmates.

CORRECTIONS RELATED

Manson Family: Where Are They Now?

Their terror brought a halt to the peace and love of the 1960s, but many members of the most infamous cult in American history live on

RollingStone

Charles Manson, the psychopathic career criminal who inspired a murderous cult following and brought a grisly end to the utopian dreams of the 1960s, has spent the past 47 years locked up in California. Manson, born Charles Milles Maddox in 1934 to a 16-year-old mother, had already spent half his life in jail when he orchestrated one of the most infamous crimes of the 20th Century.

According to biographer Jeff Guinn, Manson had been a talented manipulator since grade school, convincing classmates – mostly girls – to attack people he didn't like. He managed to escape blame for their actions, and while he would sometimes turn violent himself, it was a 1947 theft that initially sent him into reform school. He was in and out of incarceration for the next 20 years for everything from pimping to false checks.

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