Free Republic

Black Leader Condemns Bush for Not Pardoning or Commuting Sentences of Jailed Border Agents During Pre-Thanksgiving Round of Executive ClemencyWashington, D.C. - Project 21 Chairman Mychal Massie is condemning President Bush’s inaction regarding incarcerated Border Patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean and is reiterating his call for a pardon or commutation of the agents' sentences before the President leaves office in January. Massie’s call comes as the White House has announced that President George W. Bush granted pre-Thanksgiving pardons to individuals involved in the distribution of drugs and bank embezzlement and commuted the sentences of two men given...

A Grammy Award-winning rapper and music producer originally sentenced to 14 years in prison for smuggling cocaine is one of 16 people receiving pardons or reduced sentences from President Bush. John Edward Forte of North Brunswick, N.J., a graduate of the elite Phillips Exeter Academy prep school who later became a producer for the rap group The Fugees and released two albums on his own, was caught in 2000 at Newark International Airport with two briefcases filled with $1.4 million worth of liquid cocaine, according to court documents. Forte, 33, a first-time offender, was convicted of possessing the 31 pounds...

Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-New York and chairman of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties, has authored a resolution demanding that President Bush refrain from issuing “pre-emptive pardons of senior officials in his administration during the final 90 days of office.” The resolution, Nadler says, is in response to Bush’s “widespread abuses of power and potentially criminal transgressions against our Constitution.” The goal, he says, is to prevent “undeserved pardons of officials who may have been co-conspirators in the president’s unconstitutional policies, such as torture, illegal surveillance and curtailing of due process for defendants.” “This...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush issued 16 pardons Thursday and commuted the sentence of an Iowa man convicted of drug charges. Six of the federal offenses were drug crimes, while others included bank fraud, mail fraud, the acceptance of a kickback, a false statement on a loan application and conspiracy to defraud the government over taxes. Seven of the 16 received no prison or jail time, instead getting probation or a reduction in their military pensions. The longest sentence was nine years, for aiding cocaine distribution, followed by a six-year term for conspiracy to possess marijuana. With this batch, Bush...