LAPPL NEWS WATCH FOR FEBRUARY 4, 2021

Double Murderer Approved For Parole At Third Hearing; Prosecutors Barred From Attending Under Gascón's Reform

A gang member and double murderer convicted in the shooting and killing of two teenagers at a party in Los Angeles more than thirty years ago was found to be suitable for parole by the state at a hearing on Wednesday, a hearing that prosecutors weren’t allowed to attend as part of new District Attorney George Gascón's reforms. 

 

Howard Elwin Jones has been imprisoned at San Quentin state prison since 1991 for the December 1988 shooting and killing of 18-year-old Chris Baker and another boy at a party in Rowland Heights. 

 

Baker’s family tells FOX 11 that Jones, an active gang member at the time who was just hours away from his 18th birthday, showed up to the party armed with a gun, and confronted a boy who was wearing a red Santa hat, which he had interpreted as a symbol of the bloods gang. 

 

"The boy said, please don’t shoot me, and started to walk away," said Dianne Baker-Taylor, Baker’s sister. "And that’s when Mr. Jones fired at him, and the rowed dispersed and as they dispersed, my brother, in the chaos, ended up running alongside [the boy], and they both died as a result of their injuries." 

 

Baker-Taylor tells FOX 11 that Jones was initially sentenced to 45 years to life for the two murders, but after Governor Jerry Brown signed SB 260 into law in 2013, he became eligible for parole much sooner. 

 

State records show Jones was denied parole in both 2015 and 2017, but on Wednesday morning, at his third parole hearing, Jones, now age 50, was found to be suitable for parole by the state, and as part of DA’ George Gascón's reforms, prosecutors from the Los Angeles DA’s office were barred from attending the hearing, or advocating against Jones’ release, as they had before at the previous hearings.

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Villanueva Notifies Gascón That Detectives Will Attend Parole Hearings To ‘Give Victims A Voice'

 

Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva has notified District Attorney George Gascón that he will begin sending his sheriff's detectives to parole hearings to "give victims a voice" as long as the newly elected DA continues to refuse to allow his prosecutors to attend them as part of his new reforms. 

 

I cannot understand why your office is barring prosecutors from attending parole hearings," the letter penned by Villanueva to Gascón reads. "The purpose of the correspondence is to notify you, if prosecutors will no longer be allowed to attend parole hearings, the LASD will attend parole hearings in the absence of your prosecutors." 

 

"At the request of family members, the LASD will do everything possible to give victims a voice at the table to address their concerns," the letter continued.

 

Villanueva said that the decision was made "despite the lack of funding and resources to my department." "I strongly believe this is the right thing to do," Villanueva wrote. 

 

Shortly after being sworn into office in December, Gascón issued a directive on so-called "lifer parole hearings" that indicated that the office's "default policy is that we will not attend parole hearings and will support in writing the grant of parole for a person who has already served their mandatory minimum period of incarceration, defined as their MEPD (Minimum Eligible Parole Date), YEPD (Youth Parole Eligible Date) or EPD (Elderly Parole Date)."