Inmate Serving Life Sentence Granted Emergency Release Over Coronavirus Concerns
RESEDA (CBSLA) -- After over two decades behind bars, Patricia Wright returned home to her family on Tuesday. The 69-year-old was serving a life sentence for conspiracy to commit murder when Gov. Newsom granted her an emergency release due to coronavirus concerns.
"It was unbelievable. It was heavenly," Wright said of her release.
She was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder in 1998 and sentenced to life without parole. Prosecutors argue that in 1981, she hired someone to kill her then-ex husband. For the past 40 years, Wright has maintained her innocence.
"I wrote everyone that I possibly could to tell them of my innocence," she said. "Anyone that I thought would listen. I never gave up."
Wright has spent years pleading for clemency to no avail. However, she's been undergoing weekly chemotherapy treatments for terminal liver cancer, which made her a higher risk for contracting COVID-19 at the Chino Prison, where there is currently an outbreak.
"Our whole family is extremely grateful for him for being a sympathetic governor and for pardoning my sister when she had no other opportunity to be released," said Wright's sister, Chantel Monet.
Wright appears to be the first emergency release of an inmate serving a life sentence during the pandemic.
Her son, Quincey Jerome Scott, said he's glad to have his mother home.
"I've done two tours in Iraq and one in Afghanistan, and I've put my time in for this country," he said. "I'm glad now that finally I feel like there was justice done to my family."