Obama announces 42 new sentence commutations, bringing his total to 348
On Friday, PresidentBarack Obama announced that he is commuting the sentences of 42 federal prisoners, a White House press release stated.
The announcement marks Obama’s third round of sentence commutations in just over two months, and brings total commutations for his presidency to 348, according to the White House. Sentence commutations end the recipient’s prison sentence, but do not erase the recipient’s criminal record as a pardon does. Department of Justice records say the president has pardoned 70 people.
Over the past two years, Obama has indicated an interest in shortening long sentences, particularly sentences for nonviolent drug offenses, handed down in earlier, more punitive era. After the Justice Department expressly called for clemency petitions, it asked the nation’s attorneys for help handling the expected flood of petitions.
The bar responded with Clemency Project 2014, an organized effort that matches pro bono lawyers with prisoners in order to make their petitions and the process smoother. According to a CP14 press release, 25 of the 42 commutations came through the project, and of those 25, 14 were serving life sentences.
The ABA is one of the five organizations involved in CP14, along with the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, Families Against Mandatory Minimums, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Federal Public and Community Defenders. CP14 says it has nearly 4,000 volunteer attorneys who have submitted more than 1,150 petitions so far, and is continuing to do that work.
The next president may not continue Obama’s clemency policies, so the project may end this winter. The slowness of the project has frustrated even some supporters of clemency, who believe CP14 is being slowed down by bureaucracy that exists mainly for political reasons. Former DOJ Pardon Attorney Deborah Leff resigned in January, in part because of frustration with bureaucracy.
The bulk of the most recent commutation recipients were convicted of drug crimes, some involving a firearm. Some will be released Oct. 1; others are scheduled for release one to two years from today’s date.
