A Northern California man convicted of robbing and killing three people in 1987 when he was 16 years old was recommended for parole on Wednesday, prosecutors said.
A two-member panel made the recommendation for Anthony King at a hearing held at the state prison in Corcoran, the Yolo County district attorney’s office said.
However, Gov. Gavin Newsom will review the case before King is paroled and could overturn the decision.
King was living in the Sacramento suburb of Knights Landing in September 1987 when he and another man shot 35-year-old Steve Patton in the face with a shotgun in order to steal his truck as Patton fished in the Sacramento River, prosecutors said.
They threw his body in the river and went joyriding before abandoning the truck, authorities said.
Two days later, the pair used handguns to kill a couple, Raymond and Dawn Rogers, as they fished in the same spot, prosecutors said.
Raymond Rogers, 29, was shot in the back and Dawn Rogers, 32, was shot in the back and the back of the head, autopsies indicated.
Their bodies also were dumped in the river and the killers stole their car. But were arrested a month later in Oregon, authorities said.
King was convicted of robbery and murder in 1988 and sentenced to 52 years to life in state prison.
Kenneth Bivert pleaded guilty to the killings and received the same sentence. But in 2001, he received the death penalty for stabbing to death another inmate at Salinas Valley State Prison in Soledad, the Yolo County District Attorney’s office said.
The parole commissioners found that King no longer posed an “unreasonable risk to society if released,” the district attorney’s office said.
Commissioner Rosalio Castro told King: “You are now 49 years old. Your change is a complete turn-around from what we saw when you were 16. We felt you showed good insight and remorse and you have realistic parole plans,” according to the district attorney’s statement.
