Governor Gavin Newsom has blocked the release of a 57-year-old California inmate convicted of killing two search-and-rescue volunteers in a 2004 head-on collision while high on methamphetamine and heroin, overturning a parole board decision that would have freed him under the state's elderly parole program. Joseph Tidwell had served 22 years of a 45-year sentence when the Board of Parole Hearings granted his release on June 30, only for Newsom to reverse that grant.
The crash happened on July 17, 2004, when Tidwell, then 35, crossed the center line on Highway 62 and struck a Chevrolet Suburban head-on, according to the New York Post. The vehicle belonged to the San Gorgonio Search and Rescue Team, an all-volunteer group founded in 1958 and based in Yucaipa that operates under the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department, according to Justice for Phil and Scott. The five-person crew had been headed to Joshua Tree National Park to help search for a missing 17-year-old hiker when the collision occurred.
Scott Johnston, 29, was killed at the scene, while Phil Calvert, 58, died three days later from his injuries, the Post reports. Johnston was an eight-year veteran of the rescue team and worked as an electrician in Redlands, while Calvert was a facility manager for ESRI who had joined the team in 1992 — details that prompted surviving members and victims' families to organize the Justice for Phil and Scott campaign urging Newsom to block Tidwell's release, per the same organization's account.
A Friend's Long Recovery
Bob Blanck, Johnston's best friend and a fellow volunteer with the rescue team, was also severely injured in the crash, along with Tidwell's girlfriend, the Post reports. Blanck was hospitalized for three months and underwent five surgeries, as doctors repaired a torn artery and fused his lower back. Tidwell was arrested at the crash scene, and a San Bernardino County jury found him guilty of two counts of second-degree murder in 2007.
Blanck welcomed Newsom's intervention as what he called a rare act of common sense, according to the Post's reporting. Beth Greenwood, another figure connected to the case, said Tidwell could become as dangerous after release as he was before the crash, the outlet reports.
How Newsom Justified the Reversal
In reversing the board's decision, Newsom acknowledged that Tidwell had made efforts to improve himself during his 22 years in prison — completing a vocation, participating in self-help programming, and enrolling in college courses, per the Post. But the governor also cited a history of setbacks: a DUI conviction, an arrest for a second DUI that triggered a parole violation, and drug use and financial misconduct while incarcerated at Soledad State Prison. Newsom concluded that Tidwell remains unsuitable for parole at this time and ordered him to complete additional work before any future release, the Post reports. Tidwell will not be eligible to reapply for elderly parole until 2028, since eligible inmates may seek reconsideration every 18 months.
Newsom's authority to make that call comes from California law, which allows the governor to review and reverse parole board grants for inmates convicted of murder. That makes California one of just four states where a governor holds this kind of direct parole veto.
Why the Same Power Doesn't Apply to Sex Offenders
That distinction matters because, in non-murder cases such as child molestation, the governor cannot unilaterally block a release — he can only refer the matter back to the full Board of Parole Hearings for reconsideration, as reported by 930 WFMD. It's why other controversial elderly-parole cases involving sex offenders have needed fresh criminal charges, rather than a governor's signature, to keep an inmate locked up — as happened in Sacramento County in February 2026, when corrections officials granted elderly parole to David Allen Funston, who had kidnapped and molested at least eight children in the mid-1990s, before he faced fresh charges ahead of his scheduled release.
Tidwell's case sits inside a broader, and increasingly contentious, expansion of California's Elderly Parole Program. The program expanded in 2021, lowering the eligibility age from 60 to 50 and cutting the required time served from 25 years to 20. The program excludes people sentenced to death or life without parole and was originally intended to ease prison overcrowding, per the Post's reporting. Tidwell had first applied under the program in December 2024, after 20 years served, and was denied before his second application succeeded at the board level this year.
A Statewide Fight Over Who Qualifies
The friction created by lowering the elderly parole threshold has intensified as California's prison population ages.
