(The Center Square) – Following a press conference in which Republican legislators and victim advocates called on the California Board of Parole Hearings to deny the release of a convicted child molester on elderly parole, the board postponed its decision.
In an email sent to the media on Wednesday afternoon, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said the parole board’s decision will come at a hearing that could take place in four to six months.
In a press conference held Wednesday morning outside the Board of Parole Hearings’ office in downtown Sacramento, Republican legislators urged the board to deny elderly parole for Gregory Lee Vogelsang.
Vogelsang, 57, was convicted in 1999 on dozens of counts of child molestation. That case involved the kidnapping and sexual assault of five boys, according to the California Assembly Republican Caucus. He was sentenced to 355 years in prison and served 27 years before being granted a parole hearing.
“This issue is not abstract for me,” Assemblyman Jeff Gonzalez, R-Indio, said during the press conference. “I understand firsthand the lifelong impact the abuse leaves behind. It doesn’t end when the crime ends. It follows you.”
A parole hearing for Vogelsang followed the press conference, in which a panel of commissioners heard testimony from victims of sexual assault. While it wasn’t clear if all of them were victims of Vogelsang, many spoke about being victims of sexual abuse and the impact that had on their lives.
“Vogelsang has admitted he’s still attracted to young boys,” Ross Huggins, a former prosecutor on Vogelsang’s case in the 1990s, told the parole board. “Approximately three years ago, he claimed he’d ‘eradicated’ his deviant thoughts. Of course, that wasn’t true, and the commissioners at that hearing understood that.”
Vogelsang has no genuine insight into his disorder, Huggins said.
“He is not deserving of parole,” Huggins said. “Vogelsang is a substantial risk of re-offending, as he has not sufficiently had the time to reflect on his pedophilia.”
In the press conference before Vogelsang’s hearing, victim advocates criticized the parole board for recently granting release to another middle-aged child molester who was expected to serve life in prison for charges related to child molestation.
David Allen Funston, who was set to be released on parole under California’s elderly parole laws in recent weeks, was turned over to the Placer County authorities early on the morning of his release to face new charges in the county related to a separate charge of child molestation.
“To my shock and disgust, I realized that despite the fact that he was sentenced to multiple life terms, this parole board thought it was appropriate to let a pedophile who readily acknowledges that he’s still sexually attracted to children out of prison,” Anne Marie Schubert, a former Sacramento County district attorney and current president and CEO of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, told reporters.
According to the Legislative Analyst’s Office, California’s taxpayers pay $127,788 a year per inmate incarcerated in the state’s prisons. That includes costs such as security, health care, facility operations, clothing, activities and education.
Lawmakers who discussed Vogelsang’s case on Wednesday said that despite the rising costs of keeping aging inmates incarcerated, the expense is worth it for those convicted of violent crimes.
“I don’t give a damn about the rising costs. I give a damn about these victims,” Gonzalez said at the press conference.
“But when we say, ‘What about the rising cost?,’ that is so disconnected to the problem that we have,” said the Republican Assembly member from Indio. “The rising costs – they don’t matter.”
Democratic lawmakers were not at the press conference on Wednesday. Representatives from UnCommon Law, a law firm that has recently advocated for the state’s elderly parole laws, previously told The Center Square that convicted child molesters were often the victims of child molestation themselves.
“With the new charges from 30 years ago, they have nothing to do with the determination that he’s not the person today that he was then,” Keith Wattley, founder and executive director of UnCommon Law, previously told The Center Square. “The parole consideration is really based on one’s capacity for change, regardless of how reprehensible we find their crimes to have been.”
Wattley was not available to comment before deadline on Wednesday.
