For Immediate Release 
Date:  February 4, 2008      
Contact:  Monica Pratt Raffanel, media@famm.org
           
FAMM calls on Congress, Attorney General to investigate the breakdown in Pardon Attorney’s office; Thousands of deserving prisoners waiting for answer on clemency

 
WASHINGTON, D.C.:  The clemency train wreck at the U.S. Office of the
Pardon Attorney described today in The New York Times (“Begging Bush’s
pardon,” by George Lardner) is sadly no surprise to members of Families
Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM).   In a recent survey, dozens of
prisoners who are members of FAMM said they had been waiting two, three,
four, or even five years before hearing that their requests were finally
and inevitably denied. 
 
Today, FAMM calls on Congress to immediately investigate the breakdown at
the Office of the Pardon Attorney and ask Attorney General Michael Mukasey
how he intends to fix it.

“The system does not just fail to produce mercy – it fails at a snail’s
pace.  When the answers finally come, they are almost always ‘no.’ This
mismanagement and apathy is unforgivable at a time when mandatory
sentences are locking up thousands of nonviolent drug offenders for far
too long,” said Molly Gill, director of FAMM’s commutation project.   “It
is time for Congress and the new attorney general to step in so that the
commutation and pardon process works as it was originally intended,” said
Gill.

Lardner’s piece was triggered by a report produced at the end of a
seven-month investigation by the Justice Department’s inspector general
regarding alleged mismanagement.  Lardner’s piece described the pardon
office as being in complete disarray. According to the pardon attorney’s
official reports, there is a backlog of 2,501 clemency petitions still
“pending” in the bureaucratic mill as of January 1, 2008.

This is a tragedy because many prisoners seeking clemency are serving
truly excessive sentences that benefit no one.  For example:

• Barbara Scrivner has served over 12 years of a 30-year sentence. 
She played a minor, addiction-driven role in her husband’s methamphetamine
ring.  In prison, she has beaten her drug addiction, is earning a
bachelor’s degree from a Christian college, and counsels young people on
the dangers of drug abuse.  Meanwhile, her own teenage daughter is growing
up without a mother. 

• Marty Sax is a decorated Vietnam veteran and first-time,
nonviolent offender.  He has served almost 15 years of a 20-year sentence
for his part in a marijuana conspiracy.  He has been a model prisoner. 
Even the judge who sentenced him, the FBI agent, and an attorney who
helped prosecute Marty agree that he has served too much time. 

 “All Americans—even those in prison—are entitled to a government that
takes them seriously and responds to their needs,” says Gill.  “The Office
of the Pardon Attorney is not doing this, and all of us should be asking
why.”

Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM) is a national non-partisan
nonprofit organization that promotes fair and proportionate policies. Many
of FAMM's members are prisoners, children and families torn apart by
unjustifiably harsh mandatory minimum penalties. To read their cases, go
to www.famm.org

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