Paey given full pardon; Crist orders him freed today

TALLAHASSEE -- Richard Paey is a chronic pain patient in year three of a 25-year mandatory-minimum sentence for trafficking in drugs -- his own pain medication.

Gov. Charlie Crist and the Florida Cabinet voted unanimously to grant Paey a full pardon Thursday morning for his 2004 conviction on drug trafficking and possession charges.

"We aim to right a wrong and exercise compassion and to do it with grace," the governor said. "Congratulations ... and I state he should be released today."

With that, Paey's wife Linda, their three children, a family friend and attorney John Flannery II hugged and cried at the podium, the entire cabinet meeting room erupting into applause at 9:40 a.m.

It was a stunning turn in the long saga of Paey, a 48-year-old Hudson man who suffers debilitating pain from a 1985 car wreck, botched back surgery and multiple sclerosis that has left him needing the use of a wheelchair in prison.

He was first arrested in 1997 and convicted on the third try in 2004 of possessing, trafficking and illegally obtaining the medication he needs for the searing, fiery pain in his back and legs.

His supporters still contest every bit of the state's case and today, they finally found sympathetic ears eager to help. His medical condition is real, they told the cabinet, evidenced by the amoung of painkillers the Department of Corrections itself now gives to Richard Paey every day.

I don't think it's unreasonable to treat a convicted felon differently from other citizens. Most felons reoffend. The notion of treating ex-folons as permanently less trustworthy goes back to common law, and even biblical law. We stopped branding and amputating.

Remember that "felon" describes a wide range of people from the embezzler to the murderer, from a 19 year old with a underage girlfriend to someone in possession of a bald eagle feather.

Admittedly most felons didn't get convicted on their first offence, let alone their first arrest or even their first trial.

Now the only felons I'm talking about are those who have fulfilled their court sentence, restitution, fines, incarceration. Not parolees or those on probation.

Those that are done.

And I'm not talking about requiring employers or bankers giving these guys equal consideration with the rest of the population.

I'm talking about freed men and women.

Why should they not be able to vote again? How can they be expected to become part of society again if they cannot vote? What value is there to society in preventing them from voting?

And why should they not have the right to bear arms in self defence? I really don't care what the offense was. If he is determined to use a gun criminally again, laws won't stop it. The law only stops his non criminal right to bear arms in self defence.

Those that are still on parole or probation don't qualify for this so they aren't even part of the eqation. They haven't yet proven anything.

Those that have fulfilled their sentence have.

“...the dirty little secret is that rehabilitation does work — obviously not for everyone, and obviously not every time, but a good program can cut the number of released felons who land back in prison from two in three to one in three.”

If that were true than we’d see every state adopting these magical programs to cut recidivism. Your dad sounds a lot like the guys who run my state’s community correction centers. I’ve been working in the criminal justice system a lot of years and have visited some of these facilities and talked to a lot of the people that run them. I’ve even heard one say “the dirty little secret is that rehabilitation does work,” as he was giving his spiel about how great community correction centers are. Recidivism rates are lower from these facilities. They do focus on rehabilitation rather than punishment, which I think is a good thing. They try to stop some of the things like the prison drug trade and prison rape and these are noble efforts. Prison I think in many cases makes people worse than they were when they went in. But, they take far too much credit for their lower recidivism rates. They think it’s because of their “moral recognition therapy” classes or whatever it is they teach, but the fact of the matter is that the biggest factor in why they have lower recidivism rates is that they start with inmates that are less likely to continue in their life of crime. These are only relatively short term commitments. They don’t let in violent offenders, sex offenders, or people convicted of the more serious crimes. They even look at people’s past misdemeanor records to determine eligibility. Those convicted of more serious crimes, like those that carry a potential punishment of life in prison, can’t get in. That knocks out all the people who get convicted of selling tiny amounts of meth or any other Schedule I or Schedule II drugs. Not only that but if people screw up bad enough while they are in one of these facilities they’ll get transferred to a regular prison to finish out there time and not be factored in when the recidivism rate for community correction centers is calculated. Also, prosecutors usually aren’t going to offer community corrections sentences to career criminals who have been in a lot of trouble. Quite often these are young first offenders, far from being hardened criminals. It should be no surprise at all that they are less likely to recidivate than people coming out of regular prisons. It has little to do with the fancy programs. If you can come up with a fancy program that will “cut the number of released felons who land back in prison from two in three to one in three,” and actually do that well with all those convicted rather than just a select few, please let us all know about that program so that we can reduce crime and slash our prison expenses.

No, but I do believe that most people who get arrested get convicted, in almost every case without a trial, and in those few instances where people do bring their cases to trial most of them will also end up being convicted. Getting caught in the first place is another matter. Thieves may have committed a hundred thefts before they get caught. There are also though plenty of people who get arrested and convicted of felonies who have not been living any sort of life of crime prior to their conviction. They’ll get in simple fight where someone ends up hurt and it will be a felony battery, or they’ll have a spate of bad luck financially and write a felony amount of hot checks, or maybe it will be for something stupid like picking up a kid at school when they have shotgun in their backseat, or the 19 year old with his girlfriend you mentioned.

I should have been more clear in my post to you though because what I was really talking about are people who are actually caught. I don’t want people to have the misconception that people getting arrested are getting off left and right, that few are convicted, when I know from many years working in the system that that isn’t true. Most all of them will get convicted whether they go to trial or not, and hardly any will actually go to trial. The vast majority will plead guilty or no contest.

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