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President Biden has announced the commutation of 37 federal death row sentences, converting their sentences to life imprisonment without parole.
Some shit you should know before you read: The President of the United States has the constitutional power to grant pardons and commutations, offering clemency to individuals convicted of federal crimes. A pardon fully forgives a crime, restoring civil rights such as voting and the ability to hold office. At the same time, a commutation reduces the severity of a sentence without erasing the conviction. President Barack Obama granted 1,715 commutations (a record for US presidents) and issued 212 pardons during his tenure. President Donald Trump issued 143 pardons and 94 commutations.
What’s going on now: In an announcement from the White House, President Biden commuted the sentences of 37 federal death row inmates. Among those granted clemency were individuals convicted of some of the most heinous crimes, including murder, sexual assault, and acts of extreme violence. For example, Thomas Sanders, who murdered a 12-year-old girl and her mother, was spared execution, as was Jorge Avila-Torrez, who brutally murdered two young girls and later strangled a naval officer. Other recipients include Kaboni Savage, a former Philadelphia drug dealer responsible for ordering 12 murders, including those of four children, and Iouri Mikhel, who kidnapped and killed five immigrants for ransom.
Notably absent from the commutations were three infamous death row inmates whose cases have garnered national attention: Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who, along with his brother, killed three people and injured hundreds in the 2013 bombing; Robert Bowers, the gunman responsible for killing 11 worshippers at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life Synagogue in 2018; and Dylann Roof, who murdered nine Black parishioners at a Charleston church in 2015.
What the White House is saying: In a statement released by the White House, they said President Biden “believes that America must stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level, except in cases of terrorism and hate-motivated mass murder – which is why today’s actions apply to all but those cases.” They added, “This historic clemency action builds on the President’s record of criminal justice reform. The President has issued more commutations at this point in his presidency than any of his recent predecessors at the same point in their first terms.”
