Crime | quadriplegic Quadriplegic Rapist Denied Parole Calif. board rejects first inmate considered under medical parole law By Rob Quinn Posted May 25, 2011 4:41 AM CDT Copied Inmate Steven Martinez has been denied parole. (AP Photo/California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, handout) A convicted rapist paralyzed from the neck down after he was stabbed by another inmate a decade ago has been denied parole in California. Steven Martinez was the first inmate to be considered for medical parole under a new state law aimed at saving the expense of providing medical care to incapacitated inmates, reports the San Francisco Chronicle. Martinez is serving a 157 years for numerous felonies in connection with the beating and rape of a woman in 1998. The parole board noted that Martinez had threatened nurses and other female staffers multiple times. "This panel finds that he is a violent person who can use other people to carry out threats and would be a public safety threat to those attending to him outside prison walls," said the board commissioner. Martinez's medical care costs California taxpayers an estimated $625,000 a year, and he is required to be kept under guard despite his condition. Read These Next Beyonce leaves national anthem unfinished. A space capsule carrying ashes of 160 people crashed in the ocean. The death toll in the Texas floods has risen to 27, including 9 kids. A lesson in minding your own business ... at 30,000 feet. Report an error