By Daniel Trotta and Steve Gorman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A California appeals court overruled Governor Gavin Newsom on Tuesday to find Leslie Van Houten, one of Charles Manson's murderous "family" of followers, entitled to parole after more than 50 years in prison for her part in the cult's 1969 killing spree.
Van Houten, 73, the youngest of Manson's devotees, has been recommended for early release by the state parole board on five occasions since 2016, but was denied three times by Newsom and twice by his predecessor, fellow Democrat Jerry Brown.
The 2-to-1 decision from a three-member panel of the state's 2nd District Court of Appeal sided with the Board of Parole Hearings' findings that Van Houten, who was 19 when the murders were committed, has been rehabilitated and no longer poses a danger to society.
The governor could appeal the decision to the California Supreme Court.
In his most recent rejection of her parole in 2022, Newsom cited supposed inconsistencies between Van Houten's statements then and at the time of the murders, which he said suggested "gaps in Ms. Van Houten's insight or candor, or both."
But in granting her petition, the appellate judges wrote that Newsom's conclusion "fails to account for the decades of therapy, self-help programming, and reflection Van Houten has undergone in the past 50 years."
It marks the first time a court has overruled a governor's denial of parole to a Manson follower, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Manson, who died in prison in 2017 at age 83, directed his mostly young and female followers to murder seven people, including actress Sharon Tate, in August 1969 in what prosecutors said was part of a plan to incite a race war.
Van Houten was convicted of fatally stabbing grocery owner Leno LaBianca and his wife, Rosemary, in their Los Angeles home on Aug. 10, 1969. The words "Death to Pigs" and "Healter Skelter" - a misspelled reference to a Beatles song - were found scrawled in the victims' blood on the walls and refrigerator.
The previous night, members of Manson's cult broke into the Los Angeles hillside home that Tate shared with her husband, filmmaker Roman Polanski, who was away in Europe at the time.
Tate, who was 26 and eight months pregnant, was slain along with four friends of the celebrity couple, including coffee heiress Abigail Folger and hairstylist Jay Sebring.
Van Houten's 1971 original conviction and death sentence were initially overturned on appeal, but she was retried, convicted and sentenced to prison in 1978.
Although Manson, one of the 20th century's most notorious criminals, did not personally kill any of the seven victims, he was found guilty of ordering their murders.
The death sentences that he and other followers received were commuted to life in prison after capital punishment was ruled unconstitutional in 1972.
Manson was also convicted later of ordering the killings of two others that summer - music teacher Gary Hinman and stuntman Donald "Shorty" Shea.
(Reporting and writing by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Additional reporting by Daniel Trotta in Carlsbad, California; Editing by Leslie Adler)