WASHINGTON — President Obama commuted the sentences of eight drug offenders and pardoned 13 others — blasting the system that sent them away for lengthy terms as “unfair.”
“Commuting the sentences of these eight Americans is an important step toward restoring fundamental ideals of justice and fairness,” Obama said in a statement.
Each of the eight inmates whose sentences are being shortened has served at least 15 years, many after receiving mandatory minimum sentences.
Obama signed a law in 2010 that brought increased parity to sentences handed out for crack-cocaine compared to powdered cocaine.
But the inmates whose sentences he commuted were convicted under the harsher, old rules.
Prisoner advocates called the old law absurd — 10 grams of crack brought the same 10-year sentence as 1,000 grams of powder cocaine.
Obama’s record on pardons is stingy compared to some of his predecessors, with just 52 pardons. Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan each gave out hundreds.
Among those getting out is Reynolds Wintersmith Jr., a first cousin of Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, one of Obama’s most loyal supporters.
A Deval spokesman said he had no role in the commutation and learned of it in the media.