Governor Hochul yet to enact major clemency reforms

Governor Kathy Hochul committed to a number of clemency reforms in December. Six months later, it’s unclear whether any have been enacted. Photo by Darren McGee/Office of Governor Kathy Hochul

By Jacob Kaye

On the official first day of summer, Governor Kathy Hochul took to Twitter to share two photos – one showed her and her husband on a beach, the other showed her fishing.

“Happy first day of summer,” the governor wrote. “This is my favorite time of year and I can’t wait to have some New York fun in the sun.”

While Hochul has the opportunity to enjoy all that warm weather New York has to offer, an estimated hundreds of incarcerated New Yorkers who have submitted applications for clemency to her office are spending the summer behind bars. Many have for decades.

In December 2021, Hochul granted pardons to nine people who had previously been convicted, mostly on drug charges, and all of whom needed clear records to remain in the United States. She also commuted the prison sentence of Roger Cole, who had served 30 years of an 85 to 100 year sentence for a drug conviction.

Announcing the clemencies, Hochul said that she planned to make a number of reforms to the clemency process, a power given solely to the governor. A spokesperson for her office said earlier this year that at least one of the reforms would be implemented in the spring.

But half a year later, nearly none of the reforms, aimed to increase transparency in the clemency process and potentially increase the number of clemencies granted, have been implemented and applications for clemency continue to grow on the governor’s desk.

“I am committed to increased transparency and accountability in this process going forward,” Hochul said in a statement in December.

The governor’s office did not respond to multiple requests for comment before print time.

In New York, and in many other states, governors typically grant clemency, which can come in either the form of a pardon – given to someone who is no longer being actively incarcerated for a conviction – or a commutation – given to someone currently serving a prison sentence – during the holiday season. Advocates argue that there’s no good reason to save the clemencies for December and last winter, Hochul said she agreed.

In a press release issued by the governor’s office on Christmas Eve, the governor said she would dedicate additional staff resources to reviewing clemency applications in an effort to “grant clemency on an ongoing basis throughout the year, rather than granting clemency all at once.”

As of March, the governor’s office had received 39 applications, on top of at least 100 that had previously been submitted and had yet to be reviewed or were under review.

Hochul has not granted clemency in 2022.

Announcing the reforms, Hochul also committed to creating an “advisory panel to assist in advising the governor on clemency applications.”

In March, a spokesperson for the governor said the office was on track to share news related to the panel at some point in the spring, but it has yet to do so. It’s unclear whether the governor’s office is working to fill out the panel.

Steve Zeidman, a CUNY School of Law professor, leads the Queens law school’s Criminal Defense Clinic, which tasks students to submit clemency applications on behalf of New Yorkers. Dating back to 2015, the clinic has submitted around 75 clemency applications, which Zeidman says accounts for the “vast majority” of clemency applications submitted to the governor’s office in that time.

Though Zeidman said that he feels there isn’t a need for the advisory panel, he hasn’t seen any movement on the reform.

“I haven’t seen it, I haven’t heard – nothing,” Zeidman told the Eagle.

“I haven't heard anything about an advisory panel, but the staff in the governor's counsel's office that reviews clemency applications have been working diligently, in my view, around the clock,” he added. “They know which are the meritorious ones, so the need for an advisory panel, when you have a whole bunch of people who've invested hundreds of hours reviewing these applications, seems superfluous to me – it's just about providing political cover.”

The governor also said that her office would work with the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, which oversees the state’s prisons, to improve guidance to incarcerated people on what their clemency application should include. It’s unclear if or how the guidance has changed.

One of the reforms promised by Hochul does appear to be making progress, however.

Zeidman said that a number of his clinic’s clients have received a letter from the governor’s office at some point this year giving them an update on their application.

Prior to the reform, applicants often were not told whether or not their application had even been received, let alone the status of their application.

In her announcement about the reforms, the governor said that “twice a year, applicants whose cases remain open and under review will receive letters confirming their case status and providing information about how the applicant may submit supplemental information in support of their application."

Zeidman said the “letters went out.”

“A lot of people I know have received one of two different letters,” Zeidman said. “One saying, ‘We got your clemency application, it remains under review and you can supplement it by sending additional information to the Executive Clemency Bureau.’ And the other letter that even more people got was the one saying, ‘We know that you requested a pro bono lawyer and that is unlikely to happen.’”

The second letter caused Zeidman concern, he said, and revealed the need for further clemency reforms on top of the ones laid out by Hochul. There are few attorneys working on behalf of people seeking clemency. Public defense organizations do not get funding for the work from the state or city so find it difficult to dedicate resources to clemency, and for-profit law firms prefer pro bono work that will give their attorneys courtroom experience, Zeidman said.

“There are there's such a need for [more attorneys working on clemency],” Zeidman said. “There's so much good that can be done.”

Among those awaiting review of their clemency application is Robert Webster, a Queens man sentenced to 50 years in prison for a pair of arsons in South Jamaica he says he didn’t commit. Webster submitted his application in 2021, having already served three decades of his sentence in various New York prisons.

In January, Webster told the Eagle that he was hopeful after learning of the reforms Hochul committed to, but added that he was wary of investing too much stock in any one prospect of release from prison.

“This is like a marathon – I've been through court denials and all that, so I know what it's like to be rejected,” Webster said. “But I also know what it feels like to be resilient, and to just keep on going.”