SAN DIEGO — One of the most notorious child killers in San Diego has been transferred off of death row at San Quentin.
David Westerfield's death sentence remains in place for the 2002 murder of Danielle van Dam, but he's now being housed at a general population prison in Northern California.
When a jury found Westerfield guilty of kidnapping and murdering the 7-year-old girl, crowds cheered outside the downtown courthouse.
“There was an enormous expression of relief and celebration that justice had been done,” said former San Diego County District Attorney, Paul Pfingst.
Westerfield was transferred on March 12 from San Quentin to the High Desert State Prison in Susanville, California.
“It’s hard to conceive of a crime more egregious than going into someone's house at night while they're sleeping, snatching their child from her bed, taking her, sexually abusing her killing her, and dumping her body on the side of the road. His crime was egregious beyond discussion. But California does not execute people. Now, they don't even house people for execution because they're not even going to pretend that he's going to be executed,” said Pfingst.
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) moved Westerfield as part of the state’s Condemned Inmate Transfer Program, aimed at eliminating the death row population at San Quentin.
“The Condemned Inmate Transfer Program is basically a program that allows the condemned population to be transferred to these other prisons so that they can participate in additional rehabilitative programming and also take advantage of paying at restitution to some of their victims,” said Lt. Guim’Mara Berry, a public information officer at San Quentin prison.
CDCR claims it is cheaper to house condemned inmates in other prisons because they will not have to be handcuffed and escorted whenever they are walking, as is currently required at San Quentin.
Westerfield is now age 72 and with the death penalty currently suspended in the California, his execution seems unlikely.
“The leading cause of death on death row is natural causes. This is just the way that reality is coming to the prison system,” said Pfingst.
CDCR said in a news release that it is “initiating a comprehensive outreach effort to registered victims” to ensure that “registered victims are informed about the initial movements of death-sentenced individuals.”
CBS 8 reached out to Brenda van Dam, Danielle’s mother, seeking comment on Westerfield’s transfer but we did not get a response.
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