Charles Manson Follower Leslie Van Houten Recommended for Parole – for the 4th Time

BY CHRISTOPHER WEBER / AP JULY 23, 2020 11:52 PM EDT

(LOS ANGELES) — A California panel on Thursday recommended that Charles Manson follower Leslie Van Houten be paroled after serving nearly five decades in prison.

After a hearing at the women’s prison in Chino, California, commissioners of the Board of Parole Hearings found for the fourth time that Van Houten was suitable for release, according to the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

After a 120-day review process, her case will again rest with California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who could deny parole, although that move could be challenged in court.

Newsom blocked her release once and his predecessor Jerry Brown did it twice.

“As with any parole suitability recommendation, when the case reaches the Governor’s Office, it will be carefully reviewed on its merits,” Vicky Waters, Newsom’s press secretary, said in a statement.

Van Houten, 70, is serving a life sentence for helping Manson and others kill Los Angeles grocer Leno LaBianca and his wife, Rosemary, in August 1969.

Van Houten was 19 when she and other cult members fatally stabbed the LaBiancas, carved up Leno LaBianca’s body and smeared the couple’s blood on the walls.

The slayings came the day after other Manson followers, not including Van Houten, killed pregnant actress Sharon Tate and four others.

Details of the parole hearing weren’t immediately released but Van Houten’s attorney, Rich Pfeiffer, said in an email that it “went really well.”

Pfeiffer said he expects Newsom to reverse the decision again, “but the courts will have a harder time denying a writ than they did in the past.”

In May, an appeals court denied Pfeiffer’s request to release Van Houten on bail or her own recognizance. His motion argued that her age put her at high risk of contracting COVID-19 and noted that another prisoner in her housing unit had been infected.

At her 2017 parole hearing, Van Houten described a troubled childhood. She said she was devastated when her parents divorced when she was 14. Soon after, she said, she began hanging out with her school’s outcast crowd and using drugs. When she was 17, she and her boyfriend ran away to San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury District during the city’s Summer of Love.

She was traveling up and down the California coast when acquaintances led her to Manson. He was holed up at an abandoned movie ranch on the outskirts of Los Angeles where he had recruited what he called a “family” to survive what he insisted would be a race war he would launch by committing a series of random, horrifying murders.

Manson died in 2017 of natural causes at a California hospital while serving a life sentence.

L.A. in the Time of Charles Manson (Full version)

It was announced July 14th that the above documentary was an honoree at the Webby Awards.  Deb found the whole film on YouTube.  It was sort of interesting, there were a couple of things that I didn't know but most was SSDD.  The music and vintage LA scenery were very good.

One drawback is that Shreck is in it, just three short blips though.  Pamala DeBarre is in it as are the reporters from back in the day, Rona Barrett, Stephen Kay, of course. Jakobson, too.

At the end of the docu there is an interview with Michael Brunner. 

Suzan LaBerge's daughter murdered

Suzan LaBerge married Henry Wolk November 6, 1976 in Los Angeles.  On September 26, 1979 Suzan and Henry had a daughter, Ariana Jean Wolk in Nevada County California.

This July 3rd Ariana was murdered in Denver Colorado where she was living.  The details are slim, Ariana was stabbed to death in the South Park Hill neighborhood and was pronounced dead at 5:45 AM on the 3rd.

On July 7th police arrested Jose Maria Sandoval-Romero, 24, in Colorado Springs for the crime.  He has been charged with first degree murder.  The arrest affidavit remains sealed and a mug shot of the suspect has not been released because the investigation is ongoing.

Feelers are out for more information and hopefully we can update the post.

Our sincerest condolences to Suzan and Ariana's father.  It's unimaginable to lose both a mother and daughter in the same horrific manner.

Denver Post article

Thanks to blog reader Chef Chris for the tip.

UPDATE:

Article

DENVER (CBS4) – Fingerprints found on a cup helped lead detectives to the suspect in a Denver homicide. The Denver District Attorney’s Office announced on Thursday that Jose Sandoval-Romero is under arrest and facing a murder charge in the fatal stabbing of 40-year-old Ariana Wolk earlier this month.

Wolk was killed on July 3 in her apartment on the 1500 block of Oneida Street, just off East Colfax Avenue. First responders found her lying in a pool of blood in her bed and said she had been stabbed in the neck.

Three days later, Sandoval-Romero was arrested in Colorado Springs.

Authorities said they reviewed video from the night of the murder that showed Sandoval-Romero and Wolk together. Sandoval-Romero was holding a cup in the video. That cup was found in Wolk’s yard and fingerprints of Sandoval-Romero’s that were allegedly found on the cup helped detectives pinpoint him as a suspect.

A statement from the DA’s office indicates Sandoval-Romero confessed to the crime. Authorities say he told investigators that he ditched his clothes, which got bloody during the crime, and fled to Colorado Springs afterwards.

UPDATE July 21 2020

There have been two Go Fund Me pages created by Ariana's sister Rommi to help with funeral expenses and to set up a fund for Ariana's son.

This one is for Ariana's son.

This one is for the funeral expenses.

Thanks, Panamint Patty for letting us know about the pages.

Bobby Beausoleil denied parole

2016 Mug Shot

Bobby had a parole hearing yesterday, July 1, and was denied for 18 months.  It's kind of unusual because once a prisoner has been granted parole, like Bobby was at his last hearing, they continue to grant parole.  He must have done something in prison, a violation or something, to not be granted again. 

Manson family killer Bobby Beausoleil was denied parole for the 20th time during a Skype hearing on Wednesday, DailyMail.com can disclose.

The 72-year-old was previously cleared to leave jail on January 3, 2019 but that decision was overturned by California Governor Gavin Newsom three months later.

His latest bid for release was denied outright and Beausoleil will have to spend another 18 months in his cell at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville before he becomes eligible to reapply.

Read the rest of the article.