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CNN Live Today

Manson Follower Up for Parole

Aired June 28, 2002 - 11:07   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CATHERINE CALLAWAY, CNN ANCHOR: Leslie Van Houten took part in one of the most gruesome crime sprees of the last century. Today, the Manson family member is up for parole for the fourteenth time.

CNN's Charles Feldman joining us now from Los Angeles with the latest on this -- Charles.

CHARLES FELDMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Catherine, good morning. Let me tell you -- let me begin by telling you exactly why Leslie Van Houten has been inside this women's prison for almost 33 years. It was 33 years ago that she was part of a gang led by a psycho named Charles Manson. The night before the murder that she took part in, Charles Manson killed actress Sharon Tate, who at the time was married to famed director Roman Polanski.

On the next evening, Leslie Van Houten, who was then 19 years old, went to another house, the house of Leno and Rosemary LaBianca. The house was picked purely at random. Leno Bianca, the husband, was killed in one room, while at the same time, Leslie Van Houten and another member of the Manson gang held down his wife in another room with a pillow over her head. One of Manson's followers then took a bayonet and stabbed Mrs. LaBianca. At that point, he gave a knife to Leslie Van Houten, who proceeded to stab Mrs. LaBianca some 16 times.

Over the past 33 years, Leslie Van Houten has come up before this parole board 13 times. Thirteen times they have turned her down. They said her crime was too horrendous to let her out.

A judge last month said, you know, under California law, she's entitled to parole under the sentence she received, and there needs to be a road map of sorts that tells her what she needs to do to eventually be released, because, over the past 33 years, she has apparently been a model prisoner. She has helped people learn how to read. She has made quilts for the disabled. She's done all kinds of things to better herself and to better the lot of her fellow prisoners inside this prison.

And yet, if this parole board today decides to grant her parole, it will be, I can assure you, a very controversial decision. And in the end, that decision is going to fall on the desk of the governor of the state of California.

Under California law, he and he alone will make the final decision whether Leslie Van Houten will ever be a free woman. And considering the fact that this is an election year, and that in fewer than 10 percent of the cases that have come before, the current governor of this state has gone along with the parole board's decision to free someone, the chances of Leslie Van Houten, regardless of the decision reached today, being freed any time soon is very small -- Catherine.

CALLAWAY: If she were to be paroled, would it be a lengthy process? Would she been released immediately? How would that work?

FELDMAN: Yes, good question. It would be a very lengthy process. Here is what would happen. If this parole board today says that she should be up for parole, and should be granted parole, there's a 120 day process in which all the T's are crossed, and all the I's are dotted just to make sure that everything was followed, right according to the letter of the law. And then and only then, will it go to Governor Gray Davis, and the governor then has 60 days more to make a final decision. He can either agree with it, he can send it back for review, or he can turn it down flat -- Catherine.

CALLAWAY: Certainly, nonetheless, it will be a decision closely watched today.

CNN's Charles Feldman -- thank you, Charles.

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