Commutations Initiative Briefing and Q & A Phone Conference (Federal Prisoners)

Please forward this  to people who may be interested in hearing more information about the Administration’s new Commutations Initiative, particularly attorneys in public interest organizations and minority bar associations. Information has gone out widely to the federal public defender and large law firm communities, and we want to make sure that a broad cross-section of the legal community has the information needed to make an informed decision about participating.

 To: Interested Persons

 Re: Commutations Initiative Briefing and Q&A Phone Conference Thursday, June 19th at 1:00 pm (ET)

 Note: This is a nationwide phone conference briefing Call in number 800-747-5150 code 721 5631#

 Please RSVP to justiceroundtable@opensocietyfoundations.org & include your name and state.
 Several months ago Deputy Attorney General James Cole announced an initiative to review certain outdated prison sentences through the president’s power to commute, prison terms. The initiative encourages qualified federal prisoners to submit commutation petitions for consideration. The DOJ’s criteria for selection are that prisoners:
 · be serving a federal sentence
 · be serving a sentence that, if imposed today, would be substantially shorter
 · have a non-violent history with no significant ties to organized crime, gangs or cartel
 · have served at least 10 years
 · have no significant prior convictions
 · have demonstrated good conduct in prison 

It has been estimated that approximately 23,000 federal prisoners meet the criteria of having served at least 10 years. The Department of Justice has requested the legal profession to provide pro bono assistance to federal prisoners who petition the Office of the Pardon Attorney pursuant to these criteria.
 A new entity, Clemency Project 2014, is coordinating the recruitment and training of volunteer attorneys, and assisting prisoners who feel they meet the criteria to find pro bono legal representation.

 If you think you may be interested in assisting prisoners via this new commutations initiative, email your name and contact information to clemency@nacdl.org. A mandatory training is being developed that you will be required to complete.

 On Thursday, June 19th at 1:00 pm (ET) the Justice Roundtable’s Commutations Working Group will host a nationwide conference call for interested persons to be formally briefed on the Administration’s new commutations initiative, answer any questions you may have, and to let you know how you can plug into this dynamic and fast-moving process. The specifics of the conference call are at the top of this email.

 Feel free to forward this email to people interested in finding out more information about this major initiative.