Criminal Justice Legal Foundation Files Lawsuit to Stop Release Process for Murderers Sentenced to Life Without Parole

The Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, led by President and CEO Anne Marie Schubert, announced  a lawsuit against the California Board of Parole Hearings on Wednesday challenging the Board’s new regulations on commutation and recall processes set to take effect in October 2026.

The CJLF filed a lawsuit against Board of Parole Hearings (BPH) for creating a bureaucratic process for the release of life without parole (LWOP) inmates, which notably includes baby killers, cop killers, serial killers, and sexual killers. These are the worst-of-the-worst criminals who, through the California legal system, were found guilty and sentenced to LWOP.

According to their press release:

The challenged regulations create an entirely new bureaucratic and administrative process allowing inmates who have served at least 25 years—including offenders serving Life Without the Possibility of Parole (LWOP)—to seek sentence reductions or gubernatorial commutations that could allow some of California’s most violent criminals to leave prison despite sentences intended to keep them incarcerated for life.

According to the California Board of Parole Hearings, thousands of inmates could become eligible under the new process, including offenders serving LWOP, de facto LWOP, and other lengthy prison sentences imposed for some of California’s most heinous crimes, including the murders of peace officers, children, multiple victims, torture murders, and other exceptionally brutal crimes.

CJLF and coalition members contend the Parole Board created this new early-release process without authorization from the Legislature or California voters, fundamentally changing California’s sentencing laws through administrative regulation rather than through laws enacted by the people’s elected representatives.

“This lawsuit is about far more than one set of regulations,” said Anne Marie Schubert. “It is about whether an unelected administrative agency can create a new early-release process for some of California’s most violent offenders without approval from the Legislature or the voters. Victims’ families were promised that Life Without the Possibility of Parole meant exactly that. Instead, they are being forced to relive unimaginable tragedies decades after they believed justice had been served.”

Opponents of the death penalty first lobbied for LWOP before California legislators in the 1970’s. Nationally, death penalty opponents have long embraced or promoted LWOP as a “safe” and “humane” alternative that reassures the public on incapacitation while avoiding executions.

But Governor Gavin Newsom and his appointed commissioners on the Board have wormed their way around these LWOP sentences that were a supposed humanitarian alternative to the death penalty, reserved for the most heinous criminals. Newsom’s BPH created a bureaucratic process to give these criminals a chance at parole, re-victimizing the families of the victims.

According to District Attorneys and law enforcement, the BPH would not be taking the regulatory actions they have taken for LWOP criminals without Gov. Newsom’s approval.

And perhaps as nauseating, California voters have enshrined in state law the sentence of Life without possibility of parole twice, as an alternative to the death penalty.

In 1977, the California Penal Code was revised to include LWOP. Voters then approved Proposition 7, the “Death Penalty Act” or “Briggs Initiative” on November 7, 1978, by a 71% margin, which enshrined LWOP into state law.

In 1990, Proposition 115, the “Crime Victims Justice Reform Act,” was passed by voters. According to Ballotpedia, California Proposition 115 was on the ballot as a combined initiated constitutional amendment and state statute in California on June 5, 1990. It strengthened victims’ rights, expanded special circumstances, and adjusted some penalties, including for juveniles in murder cases, indirectly supporting the tough-on-crime sentencing structure that included LWOP. LWOP sentences grew significantly in scope and use after 1978, especially in the 1980s–1990s with broader “three strikes” and habitual offender laws.

But all of that law and order and humane sentencing was not enough for the left.

Since Newsom’s election in 2019, his appointees on the parole board created new rules for parole that are completely inconsistent with state law.

And particularly in LWOP sentences, they should not change once ordered – LWOP is already a compromise. This lawsuit by the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation addresses the violation of the separation of powers and victims rights.

This is why elections matter; when you vote for governor, you are voting for his choices and appointments to numerous agencies, board and commissions, as well as to the judiciary. The National Governors Association says: “These appointments may include high-level executive branch officials, agency heads, judges, members of boards and commissions, and in some cases, local officials, or temporary legislative appointments.”

We have covered some of the recent “elder early parole” cases, and because of exposure, some of those decisions were turned around. But the rot on this parole board runs deep and straight to the governor’s office.

In March, the Globe reported that Gregory Vogelsang, 57, who kidnapped, lured, and molested five young children–one as young as three years old– was sentenced to 355 years to life for sexually assaulting the children. A jury convicted him of 23 counts of forcible lewd acts on young boys. Yet, Newsom’s parole board granted him “elder” parole. California law now allows “elderly prisoners” out of jail if they are 50 years old and have served at least 20 years of their sentence to be considered for parol, and considered no longer a threat. This “law” was a gut-and-amend bill passed in 2020 entirely on party lines without a hearing or notice to the public.

After growing public outrage, the Board of Parole Hearings rescinded Vogelsang’s grant of parole in June and Newsom faced calls to resign. A judge called him (Vogeslang) “the monster parents fear the most.”

Once sentenced to life without possibility of parole, the convict is never supposed to see the outside world again. District Attorneys throughout the state feel betrayed and say this parole board has made their word worthless, after promising victims’ families that these heinous criminals would never get out of prison. 

Life in prison without parole is perfectly clear. Voters made this part of the penal code in California. Now Newsom and his corrupt parole board has been changing it through state bureaucracy and party-line legislative tricks behind closed doors.

The state of California under Governor Newsom has betrayed victims and their families. His parole board betrayed victims and families. CJLF is legally challenging there actions. 

But hey– at least Paul Pelosi’s attacker David DePape, now age 45, was sentenced to life in prison without parole for violently attacking Mr. Pelosi. His life sentence is on top of a 30-year federal sentence, so even if the parole board sees fit to grant him elder parole in five years, the feds will still keep him incarcerated until he is 80.

Added bonus: Here are all of the commissioners of the Board of Parole Hearings:

Jack Weiss, Emily Sheffield, Rachel Stern, Troy Taira, Mary Thornton, Michael Ruff, Rosalind Sargent-Burns, Neil Schneider, Excel Sharrieff, William Muniz, David Ndudim, Kathleen O’Meara, Catherine Purcell, Gilbert Infante, Clifford Kusaj, David Long, Michele Minor, Robert Barton, Kevin Chappell, Dianne Dobbs, Julie Garland