Stop Richard Pan’s Dangerous Parole
Richard Pan voted to let serial rapists and child molesters be released on parole once they turn 50 and have served just 20 years.
Because of his vote, sex offenders sentenced to multiple life terms are now being granted parole.
He lured little girls, some as young as 3 years old, then grabbed, kidnapped and sexually assaulted them. In 1999 he was convicted on 16 counts and sentenced to three consecutive terms of 25 years to life.
Those girls have carried what he did into adulthood. When one of them, Amelia, learned he could go free, she spoke out:
At his September 2025 parole hearing, Funston, then 64, was asked whether he was still attracted to young girls. His answer:
Under elderly parole, the board approved his release anyway. When the governor asked the board to reconsider, it approved him again.
On the day he was set to walk free, only one thing kept him behind bars: Placer County filed new charges for a 1996 child sexual assault in Roseville.
Under Pan’s law, this is all it takes
Under Pan’s “elderly” parole law, that’s enough to earn a parole hearing, with no exception for serial rapists or child molesters, no matter how many life sentences a judge handed down.
Forced to relive the worst day of their lives, again and again
Survivors spend decades trying to rebuild. Then a letter arrives: the man who hurt them is up for parole. They reread the trial records. They rewrite their impact statements. They sit across from him and beg the board to keep him locked up. And even when they win, the next hearing is already on the calendar.
Stop Richard Pan’s Early Release
Richard Pan voted to allow serial rapists to be eligible for early release if they were up to 25 years old when they committed their crimes.
Because of his vote, a rapist sentenced to three life terms plus 51 years was paroled after about 20 years.
Three life terms. Back on our streets.
In 2000, Lloyd Edwards forced two women out of a car at gunpoint and raped one of them. He also talked his way into another woman’s apartment, threatened her with a razor blade, punched her in the mouth and strangled her until she struggled to breathe.
Last week, Sacramento County deputies arrested him for violating parole after finding a device in his car likely used to evade law enforcement. Days later, he was released back into our community.
KCRA 3Re-arrested rapist released from jailHis vote. His program. He owns it.
In 2020, State Senator Richard Pan voted for AB 3234, which lowered the age for elderly parole from 60 to 50. Now serial rapists and child molesters who were supposed to spend their lives in prison can go before the parole board and ask to be let out.
Every hearing reopens a family’s wounds. Every approval puts another predator back in a neighborhood like yours. That’s Richard Pan’s legacy, and now he wants to take it to Congress.
This isn’t about being “soft on crime.”
It’s about the worst of the worst: men who raped children and were sentenced to spend their lives behind bars. Richard Pan voted to give them a way out. Child molesters belong in prison, not on our streets.
Enough is enough
Richard Pan voted for this. Stand with survivors and add your name to demand that Pan’s dangerous parole program be repealed and that serial rapists and child molesters stay behind bars.