A Senate bill aimed at raising the state’s parole-eligibility requirements for “elderly” inmates unanimously passed the Assembly’s Public Safety Committee, according to a statement Wednesday from Sen. Brian Jones, R-San Diego.
The legislation would raise the age when California’s most serious sexual offenders would be parole-eligible from 50 to 65. It also requires at least 25 years of continuous incarceration for an inmate before they can receive a parole-suitability hearing.
Jones described Senate Bill 356 as a reaction to a 2020 effort by Assemblyman Phil Ting, D-San Francisco, who authored Assembly Bill 3234. That law lowered the elderly parole-eligibility age to 50 and reduced the minimum time served to 20 years.
“Most Californians would not consider a 50-year-old to be elderly, and they certainly would not consider someone convicted of these crimes ready for early release after just 20 years,” said Jones. “This bill restores common sense to a program that has drifted far from its original purpose and keeps California’s most depraved sexual offenders from being released prematurely.”
Jones’ bill passed 26-9, with five abstentions, when it read on the Senate floor June 4.
The topic also has been one Sen. Suzette Martinez-Valladares, R-Acton, has spoken out about, previously opining about how the state nearly released a serial child rapist in February — despite obvious red flags — due to the current parole-eligibility requirements.
“This is a fight for all victims across California,” Valladares said in an April news release regarding a similar bill, SB 286, also by Jones. “We must prioritize the rights of victims over those of their attackers. Violent criminals should not be released early, period. Victims deserve more than a justice system that forgets them the moment a sentence is handed down.”
SB 356 is next expected to be taken up by the Assembly Appropriations Committee, which generally assesses the financial impact of legislation.
The cost of the legislation is expected to be significant, based on the Senate Appropriations Committee analysis.
“The Legislative Analyst’s Office estimates the average annual cost to incarcerate
one person in state prison is $133,000,” according to the report. “By way of illustration, if only five incarcerated people serve an additional five years each because of this bill, it would cost the state over $3 million.”
An April 1 report from the state’s Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation indicated the state currently has approximately 89,702 inmates in its custody.
That’s down about 35,000 inmates from March 2019, a year before the most recent reduction of the state’s parole-eligibility changes, based on CDCR data.
