Mississippi pardons criminals

[Ranb]

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlin...rnor-pardons-210-including-murderers-rapists/

What is it with politicians that pardon criminals right before they leave office? Maybe we need a law that prohibits pardons by governors and presidents during the final months of their term? It might make them more accountable?

Ranb

 

[Halfcentaur]

Was there a specific inmate here you object to being pardoned?

 

[Bri]

He pardoned 210 inmates. According to the article:

While it’s difficult at first glance to know the back-story of each and every pardon, what’s most striking is the number of pardons for violent crimes — nearly a dozen for murder, and two for statutory rape. Both men and women were pardoned, most of them convicted on drug, DUI, burglary and armed robbery charges.

Barbour was already under fire for pardoning five prisoners who were assigned to cook and clean at the governor’s mansion in Jackson. Four of those men were convicted of murder, and 40-year-old David Gatlin had just been denied parole just two weeks before. In years past, the governor has explained that it is tradition to pardon prisoners assigned to the mansion.

Gatlin was sentenced to life in prison for killing his estranged wife in 1993, and shooting Randy Walker, her male friend, in the head. Walker survived, and his wife Crystal Walker told Jackson’s Clarion Ledger that they’re now both afraid for their lives.

“On parole he’d at least have to check in and have some supervision,” she said Sunday. “Now he could live beside us, or we could run into him at Walmart. You’re always looking over your shoulder.”​

-Bri

 

[Spindrift]

He pardoned 210 inmates. According to the article:

While it’s difficult at first glance to know the back-story of each and every pardon, what’s most striking is the number of pardons for violent crimes — nearly a dozen for murder, and two for statutory rape. Both men and women were pardoned, most of them convicted on drug, DUI, burglary and armed robbery charges.

Barbour was already under fire for pardoning five prisoners who were assigned to cook and clean at the governor’s mansion in Jackson. Four of those men were convicted of murder, and 40-year-old David Gatlin had just been denied parole just two weeks before. In years past, the governor has explained that it is tradition to pardon prisoners assigned to the mansion.

Gatlin was sentenced to life in prison for killing his estranged wife in 1993, and shooting Randy Walker, her male friend, in the head. Walker survived, and his wife Crystal Walker told Jackson’s Clarion Ledger that they’re now both afraid for their lives.

“On parole he’d at least have to check in and have some supervision,” she said Sunday. “Now he could live beside us, or we could run into him at Walmart. You’re always looking over your shoulder.”​

-Bri

I get that feeling at Walmart too.

 

[casebro]

I get that feeling at Walmart too.

Yeah, I have to watch out for the them folks with the camera phones too. ;^)

 

[Ranb]

Was there a specific inmate here you object to being pardoned?

None more than any other. You may have noticed that I questioned the timing of the pardons more than anything else.

Ranb

 

[Puppycow]

Barbour was already under fire for pardoning five prisoners who were assigned to cook and clean at the governor’s mansion in Jackson. Four of those men were convicted of murder, and 40-year-old David Gatlin had just been denied parole just two weeks before. In years past, the governor has explained that it is tradition to pardon prisoners assigned to the mansion.​

-Bri

That seems like a rather arbitrary way to go about it.

 

[The Nimble Pianist]

I've never understood why we even have executive pardons. Anyone have a clue as to the reasoning?

 

[aggle-rithm]

I've never understood why we even have executive pardons. Anyone have a clue as to the reasoning?

To catch those times when justice fails while, technically, working exactly as it should.

 

[The Nimble Pianist]

To catch those times when justice fails while, technically, working exactly as it should.

So is it considered another form of checks and balances? Also, what makes the executive branch qualified to determine when justice fails more so than jurors and appeals processes?

 

[Sam.I.Am]

So is it considered another form of checks and balances? Also, what makes the executive branch qualified to determine when justice fails more so than jurors and appeals processes?

No legal system is perfect if for no other reason than it's made up of people and people make mistakes all of the time. Pardons are there to catch the people who fall through the cracks in the system be it through a bad prosecution, mitigating circumstances that the law didn't consider when written or even for people who don't really belong in prison anymore (for example a teenager kills someone and gets life in prison with no possibility of parole but 25 years later he has shown that he is no longer the same person that did that crime and has tried as best as he could to turn his life around).

Because of the very nature of a pardon as a last resort for when the system has failed the person there can and will be abuses of the power but I'd rather see the occasional abuse than to not see it at all and keep some undeserving people in prison.

 

[Babbylonian]

Because of the very nature of a pardon as a last resort for when the system has failed the person there can and will be abuses of the power but I'd rather see the occasional abuse than to not see it at all and keep some undeserving people in prison.

Yep.

As to the timing, it's hardly surprising that governors and presidents wait until they're about to leave office before issuing pardons. Even with extremely questionable convictions, people will still get all up in arms when a felon is released from prison by executive order. Look at the uproar when the West Memphis Three were released.

 

[Bri]

That seems like a rather arbitrary way to go about it.

It's tradition -- he didn't have a choice!

-Bri

 

[Sam.I.Am]

It's tradition -- he didn't have a choice!

-Bri

Without knowing anything about that I'd hazard a guess that only model prisoners end up working in the Governors house and that they have to stay that way to keep on working there. Being a model prisoner is almost certainly one of the things that may trigger eligibility for a pardon consideration.

 

[Ziggurat]

It's tradition -- he didn't have a choice!

-Bri

It's written, that's why!

 

[Bri]

Without knowing anything about that I'd hazard a guess that only model prisoners end up working in the Governors house and that they have to stay that way to keep on working there. Being a model prisoner is almost certainly one of the things that may trigger eligibility for a pardon consideration.

One had been denied parole two weeks prior to the pardon. In addition, being a model prisoner doesn't necessarily mean that you should be pardoned for the crime for which you're being punished. Even if it were, there were probably other model prisoners who happened to be assigned to work elsewhere, so it seems arbitrary to pardon a few who happened to be assigned to the governor's mansion.

-Bri

 

[Sam.I.Am]

One had been denied parole two weeks prior to the pardon. In addition, being a model prisoner doesn't necessarily mean that you should be pardoned for the crime for which you're being punished. Even if it were, there were probably other model prisoners who happened to be assigned to work elsewhere, so it seems arbitrary to pardon a few who happened to be assigned to the governor's mansion.

-Bri

One of the reasons for having pardons is that sometimes the parole board gets it wrong. I don't know (given what information that we have on the matter) if that is the case or not here but it's certainly a possibility.

As far as the tradition goes I'd like to think that the prisoners sent into that job had some vetting before getting such a position of trust and that being considered eligible for the traditional pardon at the end of the Governors term was just one part of passing that vetting process. I could be wrong of course but it seems to me that it had to be a part of considering someone for that job in the first place knowing what the established tradition was. It's not like they just walked down death row and picked out someone at random to work in the Governors mansion.

As to other model prisoners also being eligible for a pardon? Well, sometimes those are the breaks in life. Not everyone can always have the same opportunities. It falls under the "Life is not always fair" rule.

 

[marksman]

What is it with politicians that pardon criminals right before they leave office?

Who else are they supposed to pardon?

 

[The Nimble Pianist]

No legal system is perfect if for no other reason than it's made up of people and people make mistakes all of the time. Pardons are there to catch the people who fall through the cracks in the system be it through a bad prosecution, mitigating circumstances that the law didn't consider when written or even for people who don't really belong in prison anymore (for example a teenager kills someone and gets life in prison with no possibility of parole but 25 years later he has shown that he is no longer the same person that did that crime and has tried as best as he could to turn his life around).

Fair enough, but are governors and presidents somehow better equipped to catch those who fall through the cracks than appeals and parole boards? I admit I know very little about this so these are honest questions.

Because of the very nature of a pardon as a last resort for when the system has failed the person there can and will be abuses of the power but I'd rather see the occasional abuse than to not see it at all and keep some undeserving people in prison.

How prevalent are the abuses, in your estimation? And to swing this back to relevance to the OP, is there a reason why it seems that most pardons are given when the executive officer is about to end his or her final term rather than when the alleged injustice occurred? At first glance this seems to do more to foster cronyism than it does to rectify injustice.

 

[Halfcentaur]

None more than any other. You may have noticed that I questioned the timing of the pardons more than anything else.

Ranb

It could seem suspicious. I was curious if these inmates did not seem to deserve their pardons or if this seemed like their pardons were given as some kind of reward or through some deal. But I was wondering then if you just didn't like to see people pardoned after being convicted of a crime.