So, I considered Ash a political prisoner — not in the conventional sense of that term, but in this one: His incarceration continued because of O’Malley’s opposition to parole and because of his political aspirations. O’Malley was in his second term in Annapolis and eventually ran for president in 2016. He was a tough-on-crime Democrat who had no interest in signing off on the release of convicted murderers and rapists, no matter how old they were or how long they had served. O’Malley’s rejection of Calvin Ash’s release meant the parole commission could not consider Ash’s case again until at least 2014.