'Squeaky' Fromme said near release

FORTH WORTH, Texas, Aug. 5 (UPI) -- Lynnette "Squeaky" Fromme, who pointed a pistol at U.S. President Gerald Ford in 1975, is due to be released from prison soon, the U.S. Bureau of Prisons said.

Fromme, 60, is scheduled for release Aug. 16 because her sentence has expired, bureau spokeswoman Traci Billingsley told The New York Times. Billingsley added she had no knowledge of Fromme's plans after her release.

Fromme has been held lately at a federal prison near Forth Worth, Texas.

She was a follower of Charles Manson, who orchestrated seven murders in California in 1969, including that of pregnant actress Sharon Tate.

The Times said Fromme has been arrested more than a dozen times before she pointed the .45-caliber semi-automatic pistol at Ford in Sacramento. A Secret Service agent saw the weapon and wrested it from her hand.

A little more than two weeks later, radical Sarah Jane Moore actually fired a shot at the president in San Francisco, but her aim was spoiled by an alert bystander. Moore was paroled at the end of 2007.

Fromme briefly escaped from the federal women's prison in Alderson, W.Va., in 1987, but was recaptured the next day, Christmas Day.