The Jerry Brown Way of Pardoning: Former inmates facing deportation place their hope in California’s outgoing governor

California Governor Jerry Brown long has walked to the beat of a different drummer.  That is true on both immigration and criminal justice.  Abbie Vansickle for the Marshall Project reports on Brown’s use of the pardon power.

Here is one example of one pardon case before the Governor.  When Borey Ai walked out of prison after serving nearly 20 years for the murder of a woman during a robbery, he was stunned to see immigration agents waiting to take him into custody. ” Ai, who is now 37, was born in a Thai refugee camp before coming to the United States at age 4. His parents had fled Cambodia’s brutal Khmer Rouge regime and eventually settled in California’s Central Valley. Now, he faces deportation to a country that he doesn’t consider home.

Ai is one of about 20 Southeast Asian immigrants who are seeking pardons in the final weeks of Gov. Jerry Brown’s term, hoping for a pardon that will allow them to stay in the United States. Unlike President Donald Trump, who has focused attention on cases brought to him by fellow celebrities and on political allies, Brown’s clemency decisions focus on people facing what the governor seems to view as systemic injustices. They are often timed to coincide with Catholic holidays, a reflection of his faith.

Among the people who have received clemency recently: Southeast Asian immigrants who came to the United States as children and who face deportation unless granted a pardon; non-citizen military veterans who were deported for crimes committed after their service; and prisoners serving life without parole, who were given hope of release.

KJ