The Pillowcase Rapist and the Folly of Current Cal. Policies

A post earlier today described the case of the “pillowcase rapist” and his arrest for a new violent crime at the age of 71, following release after only half his sentence. Further research has determined that this appalling result comes from an old, misguided law that has since been fixed, not the current misguided policy. Even so, the case illustrates the folly of the current policies. It is yet one more example of the maxim that those who cannot remember history are condemned to repeat it.

As noted in the previous post, the Bakersfield Californian reports on the kidnapping arrest of Ronald Feldmeier, 71.

In his most recent arrest, BPD said officers went at 2 a.m. Monday to the 1800 block of Glenarm Court after receiving a report of a injured woman yelling for help. She told officers she was a passenger in a car with Feldmeier and based on “statements” he reportedly said, she became scared, a news release said.

The woman said she repeatedly asked Feldmeier to let her out of the vehicle, but he refused, according to a news release. She rolled out of the vehicle while [it] traveled in the 6000 block of Ming Avenue, police added.

Feldmeier was sentenced to 67 years in 1986 after he was convicted by a Sacramento jury of nine counts of rape, five counts of oral copulation, sodomy, burglary and robbery, according to the Kern County District Attorney’s office.

He was released after serving roughly 33 years of his sentence and was discharged from parole in September 2022.

So how was a serial rapist sentenced to 67 years in 1986 released in 2019? In September 2019, CBS-13 in Sacramento reported:

Ronald Feldmeier was convicted of raping and attacking women in the 1980s all in the downtown Sacramento area.

CBS13 spoke with one of his victims who said the judge in his case told her Feldmeier would die in prison.

The victim, who chose to remain nameless, she was attacked, beaten and raped by Feldmeier at just four years old.

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Now, she’s scared for her life that Feldmeier will come after her once he’s released from prison at the end of the month.

“I finally had that peace and I feel like in 9 days it’s all getting taken away from me,” she said.

The Department of Corrections said they are legally bound to observe what they call a “work incentive law” from 1983 in effect when Feldmeier was convicted even though the law has since been superseded.

“We always have to follow the law that existed at the time of the crime,” [Sacramento DA Anne Marie] Schubert said.

Schubert said at the time Feldmeier was sentenced, the law gave him “work credit.” It gave inmates one day per credit for each day served while working a prison job.

In 1983, the California Legislature repealed the prior “good time credit” of 33% off and replaced it with a “work time credit” of half off. But the law failed to distinguish among prisoners by the nature of their offense. That was fixed in 1994 when the Legislature capped credits at 15% for violent crimes. However, the Ex Post Facto Clause of the Constitution has been interpreted to require that such corrections apply only to future crimes.

Having learned the lesson and fixed the problem, at least for future cases, California would never make that mistake again, right? Guess again.

In 2016, then-Governor Jerry Brown and his deep-pocketed supporter George Soros sold the people on Proposition 57, promising that it would only shorten the sentences of non-violent offenders for the purpose of freeing up prison space to keep the dangerous inmates locked up and preventing their release by federal court order.

One section of the initiative is interpreted by CDCR to give it unlimited authority on the subject of prison credits, even empowering it to abrogate statutes by mere regulation. The 15% cap on credits for violent felons is one of the laws that CDCR thumbs its nose at. That is a key point in CJLF’s suit to strike down the regulations.

CDCR wants to repeat debacles like the Feldmeier case, benefiting violent criminals to the detriment of the innocent people they have victimized in the past and that many of them will victimize in the future.

But it is not only CDCR that is engaging in this folly. The Legislature is enacting soft-on-crime laws hand over fist as well. One of them is for “elderly parole” for criminals not yet otherwise eligible for parole on the theory that they have “aged out” of crime. And the Legislature defines “elderly” as — I kid you not — over 50. If the present allegations against Feldmeier are true, they illustrate that some criminals can and do commit violent crimes well beyond the Legislature’s definition of “elderly.”

The elderly parole statute is a prime example of finding a statistic that is true on average and assuming that it is true for every member of the population. It is true that, on average, criminals tend to commit fewer violent crimes as they age. But to jump from that statistic to the assumption that all aging criminals are harmless is fallacious and dangerous. A deeper look at the research shows that there are life-course persistent offenders who will continue to prey on others as long as they are able to do so.

California is barreling down the wrong road. We need to turn around, and soon.