California parole officials on Wednesday, July 3, rescinded the early release of a Moreno Valley man who has served 30 years of a 170-year sentence in prison for repeatedly raping his 14-year-old niece.
Cody Woodson Klemp, 68, has been incarcerated for the past three decades at the California Institution for Men in Chino for the sexual assaults that occurred in 1990 at his home.
Kamaria Henry, Riverside County’s managing deputy district attorney, said in a telephone interview Wednesday that a panel of the full state Board of Parole Hearings decided that the earlier “decision to parole this particular inmate was improvident.” Another hearing is scheduled within the next 120 days before the parole board.
“Essentially, what they’re saying is they want to undo the prior decision of the original parole panel that granted the parole, and they want to have a new hearing to decide the issue of whether (Klemp) should be released,” Henry said.
Related: Rape victim terrified at early parole for Moreno Valley man with 140 years left on prison sentence
Klemp, who was convicted in 1994, was granted parole in November 2023 under California’s Elderly Parole Program, which makes prisoners 50 or older eligible for parole hearings if they have served 20 continuous years of their sentence.
The parole board determines whether an inmate is suitable for release based on age, time served, and whether diminished physical condition has reduced his or her risk of violence. In Klemp’s case, the board determined that, based on his age, low risk for violence and marketable skills, he was suitable for parole.
The ‘process worked’
Henry said the parole board faces a daunting task of conducting two or three hearings a day, oftentimes involving very complex cases.
“I can’t say I fault them for the decision they made, though I disagree with it,” she said. “There’s a process in place to be able to appeal those types of decisions, and thank goodness that process worked.”
At the time, Klemp’s victim and county prosecutors condemned the decision to release Klemp, and District Attorney Mike Hestrin called it a “devastating blow to victims.” They appealed to Gov. Gavin Newsom, requesting a hearing to reconsider Klemp’s release.
In March, Newsom requested that the parole board take a second look at the case. That led to Wednesday’s decision by a three-commissioner panel of the parole board.
“It will now be as if the decision made at the prior hearing in November did not happen. (Klemp) is back to square one,” Henry said. “We’re absolutely pleased because our main position is that this particular inmate has not been rehabilitated, and that lack of rehabilitation is why we think he poses a danger if they let him out.”
Permanent scars
Klemp’s victim, in an interview with the Southern California News Group in November, said she was terrified that Klemp would be released from prison, and that a probation officer told the sentencing judge in 1994 that Klemp had threatened to kill the victim for reporting his crimes.
Klemp was in his mid-thirties when he repeatedly raped his niece in his home throughout 1990, leaving her with permanent physical and psychological scars. It started as playful tickling, then escalated to acts of repeated rape and psychological abuse.
When Klemp’s victim threatened to kill herself, she said he gave her a gun and told her to do it.
“He would come in my room and kick my mattress to wake me and say, ‘Wake up whore — disgusting slut!’ ” she said.
“It was because of him that I learned to cut. It was because of him that I hated me,” Klemp’s victim said during his Nov. 8 parole hearing. “Unlike Cody, for me, for his victims, there is no parole board,” she said. “We don’t get to ask or request release from our mental prisons.”
Criminal history
A jury convicted Klemp in June 1994 of 40 felony counts, including 20 counts of lewd acts on a child age 14, 10 counts of oral copulation by force or violence on a child age 14, and 10 counts of unlawful intercourse/forcible rape, court records show.
At the time, Klemp already was a convicted rapist, having been found guilty of rape in 1976 and attempted rape in 1981. The latter assault landed Klemp in Patton State Hospital for three years as a mentally disordered sex offender. Klemp’s 1976 and 1981 crimes occurred in Long Beach, according to the District Attorney’s Office.
Early release
In a statement Wednesday, Hestrin said, “Although this practice of early release is far from unusual these days, considering the inmate’s particularly violent criminal history and admissions to the parole board itself, it is shocking that such a release would be considered.”
Hestrin said his office will “continue to combat the early release of incarcerated felons on behalf of victims and public safety.”
Henry said her office has seen an increase in the number of inmates who are found suitable for parole well before they have served their original sentence, despite arguments from prosecutors that certain inmates still pose a threat to the community.
Related links
Parole board to take another look at convicted Moreno Valley sex offender’s possible release
Rape victim terrified at early parole for Moreno Valley man with 140 years left on prison sentence
Victim speaks out
Klemp’s victim, now 48, also provided statements Wednesday via news release and a video sound bite in which she appeared silhouetted with another person present.
“Every time I think about it I have to bring my mind back, because it wants to dissociate, because it’s just so unreal that this — he’d raped four times before me,” she said.
She said Klemp “will absolutely rape again” if he is ever released from prison.
“He has been committing rapes since he was 18 years old,” she said. “The only time he did not rape was when he was in prison.”
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to correct the age of Klemp in 1990.
