In the End, Compassion

Since 1991, Gov. Pete Wilson has vetoed three attempts to streamline the release of terminally ill or severely disabled state prison inmates. In a matter of days, another such bill is likely to reach his desk. He should sign it. The need is both humane and sensible, given the overcrowding and stratospheric health care costs at California prisons.

Wilson was right to criticize previous bills for failing to require both prison officials and the courts to sign off on compassionate releases and for weaknesses in public-safety assessments of the prisoners. But the new bill, AB 29, by Assemblyman Antonio Villaraigosa (D-Los Angeles), offers safeguards that eliminate both concerns.

Every day, California’s judges--their options limited by an overburdened legal system and overcrowded prisons--are forced to make tough calls, like deciding which of three highly violent offenders should be locked up in the one available prison cell and which should be put back on the streets. The job facing judges under AB 29 would be simple by comparison because inmates who are gravely ill are obviously far less able to cause harm. Under the bill, judges would consider only prisoners who, in the judgment of prison officials, pose no threat and are either permanently and severely physically incapacitated (in a coma, for instance) or terminally ill and likely to die within six months.

The state’s history of refusing compassionate releases is a case study in excessive caution. The state spent more than $880,000, for example, to maintain a 24-hour armed watch for six months over a dying prisoner, Albert Brown, who was in a coma at a community hospital. Health care costs for an aging population in California prisons have vaulted past $350 million annually, more than what 36 states combined spend on their entire prison budgets.

By requiring the courts to consider a release request within 10 days of its approval by the correctional system, the bill would create fewer cases like that of Linda Cortez, an inmate with advanced AIDS, imprisoned on drug and theft convictions. Her release request was delayed for more than four months by the courts. When she was finally released, she was blind and emaciated and had spent at least three weeks in a community hospital under armed guard.

Signing AB 29 into law is not only fiscally prudent and carefully protective of public safety, it’s the compassionate thing to do.