Shortsighted Parole Policy

Re “Davis’ Parole Policy Raises Questions,” July 30: In your article on Gov. Gray Davis’ shortsighted parole policy you note that the reports to the Board of Prison Terms are completed by psychiatrists. In fact, in recent years virtually all reports are completed by licensed psychologists. At this time the California Department of Corrections is one of the largest, if not the largest, employers of psychologists in the world.

A pilot program is underway for a panel of forensic psychologists to perform these evaluations systemwide to ensure standardized risk assessment and uniformity of result. Despite the fact that the professional evaluator has identified no mental illness or therapy need, lifer parole candidates are commonly rejected by the BPT on the basis of the board member’s own opinion that the prisoner “needs more therapy.” Since CDC mental health services focus exclusively on the mentally ill, the prisoner is left in an untenable “Catch-22.” The BPT has ordered him to commence a program of therapy that the CDC will not provide.

Many working in corrections fear that when worthy candidates for parole, such as David Ramos [convicted of murder for giving a ride to a killer], are denied, an increase in violence within the institutions will inevitably occur. If the state doesn’t play fairly and by the rules, why should the inmate who now, due to this policy, has nothing to lose? Neither the correctional staff nor other nonlife inmates trying to productively serve their time deserve to be so endangered.

D. F. Tweedie PhD

Former president, California

Correctional Psychologists Assn.

Palm Desert

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Your article on convicted murderers not being paroled reminded me why I worked so hard lobbying the district attorney in Van Nuys to go for the death penalty in a case where a young man in 1988 raped, robbed and murdered a women with a toddler son who worked for me as an apartment manager in Panorama City.

This way her family and I do not have to endure the outrage and insult of having to think about a parole hearing where some lawyer would make the argument that the killer of my friend should even be considered for being freed, no matter how remote the possibility may be. This man must remain locked up in a small cell, 24/7, until he is executed or dies of natural causes without any hope of walking out of prison alive. And that goes for the rest of the convicted killers. Thank you, Gov. Davis!

Doug Weiskopf

Cincinnati

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Your article paraphrased Gov. Davis’ deputy press secretary, Byron Tucker, as saying that “political perils have no bearing on the governor’s parole decisions,” that “the governor judges each inmate on the evidence” and that “Davis evaluates eligible prisoners with the feelings of crime victims foremost in his mind.” Tucker stated, “For them, there is no parole from the loss of their loved ones.”

For California’s electorate there is no parole from Davis’ “moral cowardice” and hypocrisy. The case of Robert Rosenkrantz [whose parole Davis blocked] must be all about politics because the parole board, the courts and the victim’s family all support Rosenkrantz’s release.

Noel Anenberg

Encino