Patricia Krenwinkel, a key participant in the 1969 Manson family killings, has been granted parole, setting up another high-stakes clash over her release from prison.
The path to freedom for 78-year-old Patricia Krenwinkel has opened again. yet her journey remains tethered to a dark chapter of California history that refuses to close. On Tuesday, at her 18th hearing to assess her suitability for release, Krenwinkel was granted parole on a preliminary basis. She remains held at the California Institution for Women in Corona.
This decision marks the third time Krenwinkel has been cleared for parole. only to have those previous approvals blocked by the governor’s office. The process is now locked into a mandatory review period. Over the next 120 days. the parole board’s legal office must clear the decision before it reaches the governor. who then holds 30 days of exclusive authority to affirm. modify. or reverse the grant. Prosecutors from the Los Angeles district attorney’s office have already signaled they will lobby the governor to keep her behind bars.
Krenwinkel was 21 when she participated in the 1971 convictions related to the gruesome spree that claimed the lives of seven-months-pregnant actor Sharon Tate. Thomas Jay Sebring. Abigail Ann Folger. Wojciech Frykowski. Steven Earl Parent. and the following day. Leno and Rosemary LaBianca. At the Benedict Canyon home of Tate and her husband. Roman Polanski. Krenwinkel testified that she chased Folger before stabbing her more than two dozen times. She also admitted to using blood to write “Death to pigs” on the walls of the home. Alongside Susan Atkins and Leslie Van Houten. she famously appeared in court with an X carved into her forehead. echoing the mark Manson wore.
Though she was originally sentenced to death. the sentence was commuted to life with the possibility of parole after the death penalty was ruled unconstitutional in 1972. Today. she qualifies for release under the state’s elderly inmate parole program and her status as a youthful offender at the time of the crimes.
Debra Tate, the sister of Sharon Tate, continues to lead the opposition to Krenwinkel’s release. Through an online petition created in 2016 that has garnered more than 100. 000 signatures. she argues that a serial killer responsible for such gruesome. random violence should never be allowed back into society.
The recurring cycle of parole grants and gubernatorial reversals highlights a persistent tension between rehabilitative goals and the enduring weight of the Manson family’s legacy. In October 2025. Governor Newsom blocked Krenwinkel’s release. acknowledging her self-improvement efforts but concluding that the danger she poses to the public outweighed her growth. He had previously cited her failure to develop sufficient insight into the causative factors of her crimes and the triggers for her past antisocial conduct.
The landscape of the Manson case is slowly thinning. While Charles Manson. Susan Atkins. and Bruce Davis died in custody. and other followers like Charles “Tex” Watson and Robert Kenneth Beausoleil remain incarcerated. the prison system has shifted. In 2023, Leslie Van Houten was released after an appellate court overruled the governor’s denial of her parole. Krenwinkel. who did not appear at Tuesday’s hearing. has previously been represented by counsel who pointed to evidence of abuse she suffered at the hands of Manson during the period of the killings.
Patricia Krenwinkel Manson family Sharon Tate parole California news