Talk of the Day enjoyed a vacation to the beach, but now it's back to work. Just in time to talk about parole and prisoners.

Every few years, another notorious criminal makes a brief return to the headlines as he or she gets a shot at parole.

This week, it's the man who killed John Lennon. Mark David Chapman is to be interviewed by two members of New York's parole board to determine if he should be released.

He is serving a sentence of 20 years to life for killing Lennon; he's already served 29 years.

Last month, it was Leslie Van Houten who was up for parole. She was a Charles Manson follower involved in the 1969 'Helter Skelter' murders in California. For the 19th time, her parole was denied.

Manson himself gets a shot at parole every five years; he was last denied in 2007. And every few years, Sirhan Sirhan -- who killed Robert Kennedy -- gets a shot at freedom.

But are some of these parole hearings even deserved? Are parole board members really going to let a Manson or a Sirhan out of prison, ever?

Some criminal acts are so brutal, so horrific, that the natural reaction by many is to have the criminal locked up and forgotten for the rest of his or her life. Should that be the case, or is there always a chance that someone can really change?