No Lame Duck POTUS - Commutes Another 111 Federal Inmates

Obama commutes prison sentences of 111 federal inmates
AP August 30, 2016, 9:40 PM
WASHINGTON D.C. -- President Barack Obama cut short on Tuesday the sentences of 111 federal inmates in another round of commutations for those convicted of nonviolent drug offenses. 
Mr. Obama has long called for phasing out strict sentences for drug convictions, arguing they lead to excessive punishment and incarceration rates unseen in other developed countries.
White House Counsel Neil Eggleston said the commutations underscored the president’s commitment to using his clemency authority to give deserving individuals a second chance. He said that Mr. Obama has granted a total of 673 commutations, more than the previous 10 presidents combined. More than a third of the recipients were serving life sentences. 
“We must remember that these are individuals - sons, daughters, parents, and in many cases, grandparents - who have taken steps toward rehabilitation and who have earned their second chance,” Eggleston said. “They are individuals who received unduly harsh sentences under outdated laws for committing largely nonviolent drug crimes.”
Eggleston noted that Mr. Obama also granted commutation to 214 federal inmates earlier in the month. With Tuesday’s additions, Mr. Obama has granted the greatest number of commutations for a single month of any president.  Eggleston says he expects Mr. Obama to continue using his clemency authority through the end of his administration. He said the relief points to the need for Congress to take up criminal justice reform. Such legislation has stalled, undercut by a rash of summer shootings involving police and the pressure of election-year politics.
Two goals of the legislation are to reduce overcrowding in the nation’s prisons and save taxpayer dollars. In 1980, the federal prison population was less than 25,000. Today, it is more than 200,000.  But the legislation’s supporters have encountered opposition from some Republicans who argue that changes could lead to an increase in crime and pose a greater danger to law enforcement. Eggleston said Mr. Obama considered the individual merits of each application to determine that an applicant is ready to make use of their second chance.
One of those granted relief was Tim Tyler, who at 25 was sentenced to life in federal prison for possession with intent to deliver LSD as he followed the Grateful Dead. He is now set to be released on August 30, 2018, conditioned upon enrollment in residential drug treatment. Families Against Mandatory Minimums, an advocacy group, said it had been working on the Tyler family’s behalf.  The release dates for the inmates vary. Most are set to be released December 28. 
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/president-barack-obama-commutes-prison-sentences-of-111-federal-inmates/ 

Tommy Monk wrote:Nobody should be in prison for life for relatively minor and non violent offences.

eddie wrote:

Tommy Monk wrote:Nobody should be in prison for life for relatively minor and non violent offences.

No they shouldn't.

I am sure sentencing is harsher in the USA. We are stupidly lenient IMO.

California’s Three Strikes Sentencing Law

California's Three Strikes sentencing law was originally enacted in 1994.
The essence of the Three Strikes law was to require a defendant convicted of any new felony, having suffered one prior conviction of a serious felony to be sentenced to state prison for twice the term otherwise provided for the crime. If the defendant was convicted of any felony with two or more prior strikes, the law mandated a state prison term of at least 25 years to life.

On November 6, 2012 the voters approved Proposition 36 which substantially amended the law with two primary provisions:

1. The requirements for sentencing a defendant as a third strike offender were changed to 25 years to life by requiring the new felony to be a serious or violent felony with two or more prior strikes to qualify for the 25 year-to-life sentence as a third strike offender; and
   
2. The addition of a means by which designated defendants currently serving a third strike sentence may petition the court for reduction of their term to a second strike sentence, if they would have been eligible for second strike sentencing under the new law.
   http://www.courts.ca.gov/20142.htm
   
   

Tommy Monk wrote:Lefties have a habit of installing 'good intended/well meaning' policies that they think sounds like a good idea at the time... but which almost always actually result in increasingly authoritarian, expensive, unworkable, counterproductive systems of ever enlarging, repressive state bureaucracy and control...

nicko wrote:What was "Ruby Ridge" Ben?

Ruby Ridge was the site of a deadly confrontation and siege in northern Idaho in 1992 between Randy Weaver, his family, his friend Kevin Harris, and agents of the United States Marshals Service (USMS) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

Ruby Ridge - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Wikipedia › wiki › Ruby_Ridge

Original Quill wrote:

Tommy Monk wrote:Lefties have a habit of installing 'good intended/well meaning' policies that they think sounds like a good idea at the time... but which almost always actually result in increasingly authoritarian, expensive, unworkable, counterproductive systems of ever enlarging, repressive state bureaucracy and control...

And rightys have a tendency to install policies that rob the public coffers, and work against the interests of the people.  They call that "responsibility"...then they go start a war to kill babies, rape young women, kidnap people and torture people on whom they cannot find any charges...well, the list goes on and on.

Tommy Monk wrote:

Original Quill wrote:

And rightys have a tendency to install policies that rob the public coffers, and work against the interests of the people.  They call that "responsibility"...then they go start a war to kill babies, rape young women, kidnap people and torture people on whom they cannot find any charges...well, the list goes on and on.

Our labour lefties do that!!!


I keep telling you that your Republicans a much more like our leftie labour lot...

Tommy Monk wrote:Not us right wingers here... we want small state and small state control... less bureaucracy and less taxes...

Tommy Monk wrote:

No... the little guy is better off from having more freedom,  less bureaucracy and lower taxes.

Tommy Monk wrote:Not said any of that...

Tommy Monk wrote:

Original Quill wrote:

Tommy Monk wrote:Lefties have a habit of installing 'good intended/well meaning' policies that they think sounds like a good idea at the time... but which almost always actually result in increasingly authoritarian, expensive, unworkable, counterproductive systems of ever enlarging, repressive state bureaucracy and control...

And rightys have a tendency to install policies that rob the public coffers, and work against the interests of the people.  They call that "responsibility"...then they go start a war to kill babies, rape young women, kidnap people and torture people on whom they cannot find any charges...well, the list goes on and on.

Our labour lefties do that!!!


I keep telling you that your Republicans a much more like our leftie labour lot...

Tommy Monk wrote:Bru... it was the eu and the echr that interfered with us being able to do this anyway...!!!


"...Formerly, the Home Secretary reserved the right to set the "tariff" or minimum length of term for prisoners sentenced to life imprisonment. However, in November 2000 politicians were stripped of this power in relation to defendants aged under 18, following an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights by the murderers of James Bulger.[4]

In November 2002 a similar decision in relation to adult offenders followed a successful challenge by convicted double murderer Anthony Anderson. Anderson had been sentenced to life imprisonment in 1988 with a recommended minimum term of 15 years, but the Home Secretary later informed him that he would have to serve at least 20 years. The House of Lords ruled that this was incompatible with his human rights.[5][6] This judgment was upheld by the European Court of Human Rights..."


Wikipedia.


And still being subject to eu court rulings as recently as 2015...


http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/european-court-of-human-rights-upholds-whole-life-prison-sentence-for-mass-murderer-10020323.html

Tommy Monk wrote:
Labour enshrined the eu echr rules into our law... which led to the removal of our powers in the first place!!!


Something that was still being fought to regain in 2015!!!


And something that is still ultimately down to the foreign eu courts to decide!!!


And these same rules are still being used mostly by foreign criminals to avoid deportation!!!


But we haven't forgotten the labour govt claims of 'tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime'... while softening up the whole of the criminal justice system and presiding over softer and softer sentences...



Bit like when labour were claiming "British jobs for British workers" while 9 out of 10 new jobs were being given to foreigners...!!!