Van Houten was 19 when she participated in two murders in August 1969.
Former Charles Manson follower Leslie Van Houten was released from prison on Tuesday after serving 53 years behind bars, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
She was released to parole supervision and “will have a three-year maximum parole term with a parole discharge review occurring after one year,” the department said.
Her release comes after California Gov. Gavin Newsom said last week that he wouldn’t ask the state’s Supreme Court to block her parole.
Van Houten was 19 when she participated in the Aug. 10, 1969, murders of Leno LaBianca, a wealthy grocer, and his wife, Rosemary LaBianca, at their Los Angeles home. The LaBiancas were both stabbed to death and the word “war” was carved on Leno LaBianca’s stomach.
Van Houten told ABC News in 1994 that she and another Manson follower took Rosemary LaBianca into a bedroom and “the sounds of Mr. LaBianca dying came into the bedroom — horrible, guttural sounds. She started calling out to him and yelling for him. And at that moment, for a brief moment, I realized, you know, these are people that love each other.”
She said Manson follower Charles “Tex” Watson handed her a knife.
“He said, ‘Do something,’ because Manson had told him to make sure that all of us got our hands dirty,” Van Houten said. “And I stabbed Mrs. LaBianca in the lower back about 16 times.”
Van Houten did not participate in the “Manson family” murders of actress Sharon Tate and four others, who were killed at another Los Angeles home one night earlier.
While Manson didn’t commit the killings himself, he commanded his followers to do so. Manson died in prison in 2017.