Manson Family Murderer Released From Prison

Leslie Van Houten, one of the Manson family cult members convicted of murdering a Los Angeles couple in 1969, was released from prison yesterday.  The LA Times reports that, like previous governors, Gavin Newsom had rejected the state parole board’s recommendation that Van Houten be released, but earlier this year a divided State Court of Appeal overruled the Governor, who chose not to appeal that ruling to the state Supreme Court.   The day after cult leader Charles Manson ordered the brutal murders of actress Sharon Tate and four others in her Benedict Canyon home, Manson accompanied Van Houten and five other cult members to the home of Los Feliz couple Leno and Rosemary La Bianca.  After Manson had tied the couple up and put pillowcases over their heads, cult member Tex Watson stabbed Lino to death.  Watson then ordered Van Houten and Patricia Krenwinkel to hold down Rosemary.  Watson stabbed her several times, then gave the knife to Van Houten, who stabbed the woman at least fourteen times.  The women then wrote “death to pigs” on the wall and “healter skelter” on the refrigerator door with Leno’s blood.

All of the murderers, including Manson, were convicted and sentenced to death in 1971, but a year later the California Supreme Court’s 6-1 ruling  in People v. Anderson held that the state’s death penalty was unconstitutional.  As a result, the death sentences for Manson and his accomplices in the Tate-LaBianca murders were converted to life in prison with the possibility of parole.

Attorneys for Van Houten told reporters that she has been a model prisoner and acquired a college degree.

A relative of one of the victims said, “It’s difficult to hear when Leslie Van Houten and her attorneys state that, Leslie is a changed person and she is rehabilitated.  Rosemary and Leno LaBianca remain unchanged….They are just as dead today as when they were killed on the night of August 10, 1969.”

The members of the state Board of Parole serve at Governor Newsom’s pleasure.  Two of the members of the Second District Court of Appeal panel that ordered Van Houten’s release were appointed to the court by Governor Jerry Brown.  The third, who dissented, was appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.