Posted on 03/11/2003 12:03:19 PM PST by Liz
February 19, 2001
In eight years as President, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton each issued roughly 400 pardons. But in their final days, just 10 trickled out of Reagan's White House, while 177 flooded out of Clinton's. And Marc Rich's pardon isn't the only one that appalled federal prosecutors. While most of the 177 were for minor drug and fraud offenses, roughly a third raise serious questions.
A TIME analysis of the pardon fever--the symptoms included well-connected lawyers and pols pulling strings, bypassing the Justice Department and sending petitions directly to the White House, often at the last minute--turned up these eye-popping remissions of sin.
The Big Apple Gang
U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White is furious at Clinton for several New York cases. In 1993 and '94, Harvey Weinig, 53, helped launder at least $19 million for the Cali drug cartel. Justice strongly opposed his petition, but Clinton commuted Weinig's 11-year sentence--cutting it in half--and now he is scheduled to be set free. Last week White released documents showing Weinig was also involved in a kidnapping plot. Former White House aide David Dreyer, a relative of Weinig's, told TIME he asked Clinton chief of staff John Podesta and former White House counsel Beth Nolan for the commutation "as an act of mercy."
Edward Downe Jr., a publishing and financial executive, pleaded guilty to insider trading in 1993. He was sentenced to three years' probation, and paid $11 million in fines. Downe has contributed $21,500 to Democrats since 1991, including $1,000 to Hillary Clinton's Senate campaign. His application went straight to Clinton, and White's office learned about it only the night before his pardon.
William Fugazy, a friend of Mario Cuomo's, was known as the limo king of New York until he landed in bankruptcy court in 1997. Convicted of hiding $75 million from creditors, he was sentenced to two years' probation. Justice rejected his petition last year because guidelines require applicants to wait for five years after conviction. Clinton ignored the guidelines.
The Radicals
White is also upset about the commutation Clinton gave to Susan Rosenberg, who was convicted in 1984 of carrying explosives and weapons for the Weather Underground. One of Rosenberg's guns was bought with fake ID by Linda Sue Evans, who also took part in the 1983 bombing of an empty room at the U.S. Capitol to protest the invasion of Grenada. Clinton's order freed both from prison.
The Protester
During a 1970 protest at St. Louis University, Howard Mechanic lobbed a cherry bomb at police and firefighters. He fled to Arizona and began a new life as a businessman. But his secret came out when he ran for the Scottsdale city council last year, and he went to federal prison. His successful pardon application drew support from several Senators. But in Clinton's haste to process so many pleas, he signed a pardon letter that contained a typo and ended up clearing Mechanic of the wrong charge.
Connections Pay
Jesse Jackson personally appealed to Clinton to commute the sentence of Melvin Reynolds, a former Illinois Congressman serving seven years for corruption and for having sex with an underage campaign worker. Other Jackson associates who received clemency include John H. Bustamante, 70, a former adviser who pleaded guilty to fraud in 1993, and Dorothy Rivers, a former Operation PUSH official serving six years for embezzling more than a million dollars in federal aid for homeless children. She will be freed from prison next year.
Former Arizona Governor John Fife Symington sent his application directly to the White House three weeks before Clinton left office. In 1997 the Republican was convicted of fraud and forced out of office. The verdict was overturned, but prosecutors have been weighing whether to retry the case. Some Arizonans think the pardon was payback: Symington saved Clinton from drowning at a '60s beach party.
So Does Cash
After Carlos Vignali, 30, was sentenced to 14 years for cocaine trafficking in 1994, his father took an interest in politics, donating more than $150,000 to Democratic causes, including $10,000 to the 2000 Democratic National Committee. Letters of support from several leading California pols and a Roman Catholic Cardinal helped persuade Clinton to commute Vignali's sentence. Angry prosecutors call Vignali a drug kingpin; defenders say he was just a minor player.
Oops, He Did It Again
Almon Glenn Braswell, a Florida multimillionaire who donated to both George W. Bush and the Florida G.O.P., was pardoned for a 1983 conviction on perjury and tax-evasion charges stemming from selling dubious health products. Problem is, he's still under investigation for money laundering and more tax evasion. His application bypassed Justice, which helps explain why no one in the White House knew. He could be prosecuted for the alleged new offenses.
Friends and Family
Henry Cisneros, the former HUD Secretary, was convicted of lying to the FBI about payments to a mistress. His mistress, Linda Medlar Jones, was pardoned as well; neither application went through Justice.
Florida attorney Arnold Prosperi, 52, faced three years in prison for tax fraud. Prosperi managed Clinton's 1967 campaign for student-council president at Georgetown University. Clinton commuted his sentence to house arrest.
Richard Riley Jr., was sentenced in 1992 to house arrest and probation on cocaine and marijuana charges. His father Richard Riley was Clinton's Education Secretary.
Roger Clinton, the President's brother, served one year on cocaine charges.
Former CIA Director John Deutch just a day before the pardon agreed to plead guilty to improperly storing classified materials on his home computer.
You just getting around to reading this?
FROM BARBARA OLSON'S BOOK: In August 1999 Clinton pardoned 16 FALN terrorists without even being asked, in a move that was widely seen as a cynical ploy to win Hispanic votes for his wife's New York Senate bid.
The group had planned and executed 130 bombing attacks on New York, Chicago and Washington, D.C., from 1974 to 1983. Miraculously, the FALN managed to kill just six Americans.
But hundreds more were seriously wounded. Law enforcement officials were stunned when Clinton decided to pardon the FALN bombers. "The FBI's assistant director of national security, Neil Gallagher, said that the people turned loose by Clinton 'are criminals, and they are terrorists, and they represent a threat to the United States,'" Olson wrote. In a subchapter eerily headlined "Pardons for Terrorists Send a Signal," she reported: "President Clinton had not bothered to consult with relatives of victims of FALN terrorism. In fact, the survivors of those murdered and those whose lives had otherwise been destroyed by the terrorists were not even informed that their attackers were being released." Olson continued: "Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder ... conceded that the nation owed much greater consideration to the victims. And Holder's boss, Janet Reno, explicitly acknowledged that groups aligned with the FALN still posed a threat to national security."
In comments turned gut-wrenching in light of last month's attacks, former Justice Department pardon attorney Margaret Love told the late author that Clinton's terrorist pardons should have set off alarm bells. "We should have seen a big flashing red light because of the FALN cases. ...
That was a foreshoadowing of what happened later." Love was referring to Clinton's January 2001 pardons of drug dealers and international fugitives, not the attacks on the U.S., which no one foresaw. But it's nearly impossible now to read those words as anything but prophecy of the terrorist acts that murdered Olson and nearly 6,000 others (Sept 11).
Thanks Liz, it's good not to forget. I miss Barbara Olson, she was a breath of fresh air.
I have never heard anything about this. Anyone? If true Symington just went down another notch in my book.
Question: Former Arizona governor Fife Symington, a Republican, was pardoned by President Clinton for offenses involving his activities as a real-estate developer. Is he related to the late Stuart Symington of Missouri, who served in the Truman administration and was later a senator and 1960 presidential hopeful? Also, I have heard that Fife Symington once saved a young Bill Clinton from drowning. Is that true? – Frank Ferrari, Mesa, Ariz.
Answer: Yes on both counts. First, John Fife Symington III is a distant cousin of Stu, who served four terms in the Senate as a Democrat from 1953 through 1976. And second, when they were college students in the 1960s – Fife at Harvard, and Clinton at Georgetown – Symington saved Clinton at a beach party in Massachusetts, when young Bill was being pulled away by a strong tide.
a ha hha ha, don't make me laugh!!
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