Ex-Panther Leader Johnny Spain Remains Free

Former Black Panther leader Johnny Spain, a “San Quentin Six” defendant who spent 21 years behind bars, retained his freedom Thursday when a Los Angeles Superior Court judge refused to overturn the order that brought his release from prison.

Judge Kathleen Parker denied a motion by the state attorney general’s office asking her to rescind her March 8 finding that ordered Spain’s release from the California Medical Facility at Vacaville last month.

After the ruling, the judge seemed somewhat surprised when attorney Dennis P. Riordan, who has worked to free Spain for a dozen years, summoned his 38-year-old client to the bench and introduced him to the judge. Spain asked Parker how she was doing and thanked her.

“I’m doing fine,” said Parker, peering down at Spain. “You don’t seem to be out of the woods yet.”

Spain faces possible future action by the state Board of Prison Terms and a possible retrial on murder and conspiracy charges stemming from a 1971 San Quentin riot that left three guards and three inmates dead.

But, for the near future, he is free to visit relatives in Los Angeles and return to San Francisco where he said he had “to go to work Tuesday” as an electrician. “The most important thing is for me to establish the most normal life I can,” he told reporters.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Ronald E. Niver filed notice of the state’s intention to appeal Parker’s latest ruling. He said he will ask Board of Prison Terms officials what they want to do now.

In more than an hour of argument, Niver said that Parker should overturn her approval of a writ freeing Spain because it was based on a three-member parole panel’s Feb. 11 “proposed decision” and had not been approved by the full Board of Prison Terms.

And, since the full board recently ordered the smaller panel to reconsider its decision to parole Spain sometime next year, Niver argued that Parker had based her order freeing Spain on conditions that no longer exist as far as Spain is concerned. “It’s almost like a contract that was never signed,” Niver said.

Parker ruled last month that the three-member board had erred when it decided that Spain should not be released from prison before next spring because of disciplinary infractions committed behind bars.

The judge found that Spain already had been punished for the infractions under a now-defunct law requiring forfeiture of time off for good behavior.

Spain was convicted of the 1966 robbery-murder of a man in East Los Angeles. He was serving an indeterminate sentence for the crime at the time of the San Quentin riot and was the only person convicted of murder in the aftermath of the bloody prison uprising.

Spain was not accused of killing the guards but of participating in an escape attempt leading to the deaths.

His San Quentin conviction was overturned in 1986 by U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson, who ruled that Spain was denied a fair trial when he was shackled with 25 pounds of chain during most of the hearing.

Last month, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments by the state that Spain’s conviction should be reinstated and that he should not be retried.