Stan Lim/Pool/Los Angeles Daily News/AP/FILE
Leslie Van Houten was 19 when she met Charles Manson and joined the cult later dubbed the “Manson family.”
CNN –
Leslie Van Houten, a former Charles Manson supporter and convicted murderer, was released from a California prison on Tuesday, a prison spokesman told CNN.
Van Houten was released under parole supervision, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokeswoman Mary Xjimenez said in a statement. Their maximum suspended sentence is three years, with a parole review after one year, Xjimenez said.
Van Houten, now in her 70s, was 19 when she met Manson and joined the murderous cult later dubbed the “Manson family.”
Before her release on Tuesday, she was serving a concurrent sentence of seven years to life after being convicted of her role in the 1971 murder of supermarket manager Leno LaBianca and his wife Rosemary at their Los Angeles home.
CNN has reached out to Van Houten’s attorney for comment.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office said Friday it would not appeal an appeals court decision in May that gave Van Houten the option of parole, clearing the way for her release.
“More than 50 years after the Manson Cult committed these brutal crimes, the victims’ families are still feeling the effects, as are all Californians. Governor Newsom has suspended Ms. Van Houten’s parole three times since taking office and has defended her challenges to those decisions in court,” Erin Mellon, a spokeswoman for the governor, said in a statement Friday.
“The Governor is disappointed by the Court of Appeals’ decision to release Ms. Van Houten, but will not take any further action as efforts to seek further appeals are unlikely to succeed. The California Supreme Court accepts appeals in very few cases and generally does not select cases based on this type of factual finding,” the statement continued.
Van Houten and her team were “thrilled” by the announcement, Nancy Tetreault, Van Houten’s attorney, told CNN on Friday.
After 53 years in prison, Van Houten will participate in a transitional housing program to help her with vocational training, teach her how to find a job and make a living, Tetreault told CNN last week.
“If you think about it, she never used an ATM and never owned a cellphone,” Tetreault said. The attorney told CNN she and her client discussed the likelihood that she would be overwhelmed when she returned to everyday activities, such as going to the supermarket.
After her conviction, Van Houten was sentenced to death. However, the death penalty was overturned after California abolished the death penalty, and her sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. She was first eligible for parole in 1977, and a panel of the California Parole Board first recommended her release in 2016 after appearing before the board 22 times, CNN reported.
However, that decision was blocked five times by state governors — twice by former Governor Jerry Brown, who cited the horrific nature of the murders and Van Houten’s zealous involvement, and three times by Governor Gavin Newsom.
In 1994, in a prison interview with CNN’s Larry King, Van Houten described her role in the murders.
“I walked in and Ms. LaBianca was on the floor and I stabbed her,” said Van Houten, who was 19 at the time of the murders. “Lower back about 16 times.”