Share
Commentary

Outcry Erupts as California Prepares to Release 'Pillowcase Rapist' Who Terrorized Dozens of Women

Share

At some point, Americans must recognize that the people who run their institutions care nothing for their interests.

According to KTLA in Los Angeles, local officials have protested a decision to release a violent serial rapist into the Los Angeles County community of Juniper Hills.

Meanwhile, concerned residents of the nearby city of Palmdale, nestled in California’s Antelope Valley, have also objected to the planned placement of 73-year-old Christopher Hubbart, known as the “Pillowcase Rapist,” so near to their homes.

On Monday, Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger set forth her objections in a letter to Judge Robert S. Harrison of the Los Angeles County Superior Court, which has jurisdiction over the placement site.

“There are 25 homes within a square mile of the nominated site,” Barger wrote. “Single women and women with children live in those homes. A resident who identified herself as having been a victim of sex trafficking, a rape survivor, and now suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder would have to live near this Sexually Violent Predator in perpetuity, along with her daughter.”

Indeed, Hubbart’s diabolical history of violence against women should preclude him from ever enjoying even limited freedom.

“A man who has admitted to raping over 40 women and suspected of raping dozens more is not fit for release or community reintegration at any level. Christopher Hubbart belongs in a locked facility where there is no chance of him ever again harming another human being,” Barger concluded.

Hubbart’s 40 confessed rapes constitute by far the worst part of this story. But government officials’ unfathomable behavior makes for a shameful subtext.

According to the Antelope Valley Press, officials placed Hubbart in that same community ten years ago. In 2014, the serial rapist occupied a house in Lake Los Angeles, east of Palmdale, before violating the terms of his release and returning to Coalinga State Hospital.

Should the death penalty be used more frequently in particularly heinous cases?

Palmdale Mayor Austin Bishop echoed Barger’s objections.

“Our greater Antelope Valley community has been through this before with rapist Hubbart,” the mayor said in a statement. “The only place this dangerous criminal belongs is in confinement. Both the City and myself personally will be submitting comments objecting to his release and his placement in Pearblossom. We need to protect our community. Hubbart’s mere presence will haunt and strike fear in many women.”

In a news release earlier this month, Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón — a product of left-wing billionaire George Soros’s coordinated assault on law and order nationwide — issued a more tepid-sounding objection that challenged the placement site itself, not Hubbart’s release.

“Continuing to release sexually violent predators into underserved communities like the Antelope Valley is both irresponsible and unjust,” Gascón said. “Repeatedly placing these individuals in the same community shows a blatant disregard for the safety and well-being of our residents. Our deputy district attorneys will persist in opposing Mr. Hubbart’s placement in the Antelope Valley. We must demand more from our judicial system, ensuring decisions serve the best interests of our communities while exploring alternative locations for these placements.”

In truth, soft-on-crime officials like Gascón put California women in danger in the first place.

Related:
First 'Super Sanctuary' Created in San Diego, Would Literally Protect Jailed Rapists from Deportation

According to the Los Angeles Daily News, Hubbart “used pillowcases to dampen the screams of dozens of victims, from Southern to Northern California, whom he attacked between 1971 and 1982.”

The Daily News reported that detail in Aug. 2016, when officials took Hubbart into custody for violating the terms of his release during his residence in Lake Los Angeles.

Incredibly, Hubbart admitted to raping 40 women, including 26 in Los Angeles County, between 1971 and 1982.

After a court deemed him a “mentally disordered sex offender” in 1972, he spent time at Atascadero State Hospital. Then — maddeningly — doctors released him in 1979 after concluding that he posed no threat to the public.

Hubbart then found his way to the San Francisco Bay Area, where he raped another 15 women in two years.

Still, following imprisonment, he received parole in 1990.

Santa Clara County applied the official “Sexually Violent Predator” tag to Hubbart in 1996.

Meanwhile, in that same year, California’s Sexually Violent Predator Act took effect.

For reasons known only to the deranged liberals who govern that failing state, the act included a Conditional Release Program, which, according to a California Department of State Hospitals fact sheet, dates to 1986.

CONREP allegedly “facilitates safe transition back to the community.”

Moreover, the SVP prioritizes “treatment and rehabilitation, not punishment.”

Apparently, the state believes that the women and girls of the Antelope Valley should take comfort in that knowledge.

In sum, the moral and intellectual descendants of the medical professionals who deemed Hubbart safe for reintegration in 1979, before he proceeded to rape another 15 women, as well as those who paroled him in 1990 and again in 2014, want you to know that you can trust them this time.

Where are the men of Juniper Hills and Palmdale? One wonders how they stand for California officials’ repeated assaults on their women and girls.

Truth and Accuracy

Submit a Correction →



We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.

Tags:
, , , , , , ,
Share
Michael Schwarz holds a Ph.D. in History and has taught at multiple colleges and universities. He has published one book and numerous essays on Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the Early U.S. Republic. He loves dogs, baseball, and freedom. After meandering spiritually through most of early adulthood, he has rediscovered his faith in midlife and is eager to continue learning about it from the great Christian thinkers.
Michael Schwarz holds a Ph.D. in History and has taught at multiple colleges and universities. He has published one book and numerous essays on Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the Early U.S. Republic. He loves dogs, baseball, and freedom. After meandering spiritually through most of early adulthood, he has rediscovered his faith in midlife and is eager to continue learning about it from the great Christian thinkers.




Advertise with The Western Journal and reach millions of highly engaged readers, while supporting our work. Advertise Today.

Conversation