Pubdate: Tue, 03 Dec 2013
Source: San Francisco Chronicle (CA)
Copyright: 2013 Hearst Communications Inc.
Contact: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/submissions/#1
Website: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/388
Author: Debra J. Saunders

OBAMA'S TURKEY OF A PARDON RECORD

Another Thanksgiving has passed without a presidential commutation 
for Clarence Aaron, who at age 24 was sentenced to life without 
parole for a first-time nonviolent drug conviction in 1993.

President Obama has the unfettered power to pardon ex-cons and 
commute the sentences of federal inmates. Yet this term, he has used 
that power to commute the sentences of turkeys only - no people, even 
though the ACLU figures that close to 2,000 nonviolent offenders are 
serving sentences of life without parole in federal prisons.

Aaron wasn't a buyer or a seller but a facilitator who hooked up two 
professional drug dealers. All but one of Aaron's confederates has 
been released from prison. His remaining co-defendant is due for 
release next year.

Why did Aaron get the longest time? He didn't testify against the 
higher-ups, who sold or bought 9 kilograms of cocaine and planned to 
traffic another 15 kilograms. They cooperated with authorities. Also, 
the buyer planned to convert the powder cocaine into crack (which 
carries a harsher federal mandatory minimum sentence). The government 
was able to charge defendants for quantities not traded. Because 
Aaron didn't know how to game the system like a pro, he got life 
without parole.

That's a misleading term, according to Julie Stewart, president of 
Families Against Mandatory Minimums. It's not a sentence of life as 
much as a sentence to live until you die in prison.

In 2007, President George W. Bush asked the Department of Justice 
pardon attorney to revisit its recommendation to deny Aaron a 
commutation. Pardon attorney Ronald Rodgers told the White House he 
still believed Aaron's petition should be denied. Problem is, 
according to a 2012 inspector general's report, Rodgers withheld 
vital information on the case - that the sentencing judge and 
prosecutor's office had reversed their staunch opposition to a commutation.

Even though he misled the previous president, Rodgers remains on the 
job. Attorney General Eric Holder gives lip service to reforming the 
draconian sentencing system, yet after winning re-election, his boss 
has not shown mercy to a single nonviolent offender.

Pardon Power blogger P.S. Ruckman Jr. rates the Obama administration 
as "one of the most merciless in history." George W. Bush had a better record.

I can hear apologists leap to the president's defense. Obama dare not 
use this power, they pant, because Republicans would slam him for it.

For those critics I have two words: Eugenia Jennings.

Never heard of her? That's because there was no hue and cry when 
Obama commuted the Illinois woman's sentence in 2011, in time for 
Jennings to make it home for Christmas. She is the only recipient of 
an Obama commutation.

Jennings was an 18-year-old mother when she was sentenced to 22 years 
for her third drug offense - selling a small amount of crack cocaine 
to a federal informant. She clearly was no criminal mastermind, but 
in prison, she wised up and earned an electrician's diploma.

Jennings died from leukemia in October. The Alton Telegraph reports 
that 200 people attended a standing-room-only service for "a woman 
who many hold as a symbol of strength and redemption."

There is nothing stopping Obama from repeating this amazing success. 
I have to figure he just doesn't care.
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