Pardon me? Obama’s record 1,023 commutations bypass Arizona so far

Regional News

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Arizona and Nevada have never had much in common with Vermont – until last month.

Those three are now the only states that have not been touched by President Barack Obama’s record-setting pace of prison sentence commutations, with 1,023 nonviolent federal criminals having their sentences reduced so far.

Experts say there’s likely nothing other than luck, or lack of it, behind the fact that the three states have been passed over.

“It’s more a function of what the prosecutors did 10 or more years ago than it is of there being some magic number for each state,” said Cynthia Roseberry, project manager at the Clemency Project.

The 1,023 commutations by Obama so far dwarf those of any preceding president and are more than the total of the previous 11 presidents combined, according to the White House. The commutations, in addition to 70 pardons issues by the president, are part of a larger administration effort on justice reform.

Many of those who have had their sentences shortened were nonviolent drug offenders sentenced to what would be considered overly harsh sentences today, of decades or life in prison under mandatory sentencing laws that were in place at the time.