Getting Out Early?

By Lawrence Hurley
Few people were surprised when earlier this year the California parole board declined to release from prison Susan Atkins, a Charles Manson follower and convicted murderer. Atkins, who is dying of brain cancer, had requested compassionate release, a remedy available to inmates who have less than six months to live and are no longer a threat to society.

Her denial was due in part to her notoriety as one of the killers of pregnant actress Sharon Tate and seven others in the summer of 1969. But legal experts predict that in coming years more terminally ill inmates will seek to spend their dying days in freedom as the inmate population ages and the Department of Corrections struggles to provide adequate health care in overcrowded prisons.

In fact, the prison service system must find $2.5 billion to begin making major upgrades to its health care facilities, according to the court-appointed receiver tasked with solving the problem?and this is not likely to go unnoticed by inmates and their lawyers, says attorney Kara Dansky, executive director of the Stanford Criminal Justice Center.

Over the past decade, about a dozen prisoners a year have been granted compassionate release through a tightly structured process. Before a judge will even consider a request, for example, inmates need recommendations from prison officials and?in most cases?the parole board, says Department of Corrections spokesperson Terry Thornton. ?The law,? she says, ?is very clear.?

Though Atkins never stood a real chance of being released, less notorious convicts might well prevail, suggests Steve Fama, an attorney with the Prison Law Office, a nonprofit that provides legal assistance to inmates. Compassionate release is ?not all that common, but it does happen,? Fama says, adding that the hot-button issue of prison health care should be less of a deciding factor than ?the hard question of whether a person who is terminally ill should continue to be punished through imprisonment.?

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