Gov grants clemency to over a dozen New Yorkers, including two convicted of murder

Governor Kathy Hochul last week quietly granted clemency to over a dozen New Yorkers. Among them, she commuted the sentences of two men who were convicted of murder, which advocates celebrated this week.File photo by Mike Groll/Office of Governor Kathy Hochul

By Jacob Kaye

Governor Kathy Hochul quietly granted over a dozen clemencies last week, hours before the start of Memorial Day weekend.

The latest round of clemencies granted on Friday marks the first time Hochul has used the power given only to the governor in 2024, and the sixth time she’s used the power since first taking office in 2021.

Of the clemencies she granted on Friday afternoon, 11 were pardons and two were sentence commutations. Overall, Hochul has granted clemency to 72 people since taking office.

Though once a power exercised almost exclusively around Christmas time, the fact that Hochul granted the clemencies in the spring is no longer unusual – Hochul first began granting clemencies on a rolling basis last year.

What was unusual, advocates say, were the types of sentences the governor commuted on Friday.

Both of the men who saw their sentences commuted last week were convicted of murder.

Criminal justice advocates say that by granting clemency to those convicted of the most severe charge, the governor is communicating to those incarcerated that no one crime is without forgiveness, a message they have been calling on the governor to send for years. It also communicates at least some form of commitment to combating mass incarceration and the scores of lengthly sentences handed out in the ‘80s and ‘90s to mostly young Black and brown men in New York, many of whom are either at or approaching retirement age.

“If we're really serious about addressing mass incarceration, if we're really serious about giving people second chances, then we can't turn our back on people convicted of homicide,” said Steve Zeidman, a professor at the CUNY School of Law and the director of its Criminal Defense Clinic. “That's really what it comes down to.”

Last year, Hochul commuted the sentences of 14 New Yorkers. Of those, only one was convicted of murder – the others were mostly convicted of burglary or drug-related charges.

Though the overall number of sentence commutations was far smaller on Friday when compared to other rounds of clemency granted by Hochul, Zeidman says that, at least during this go around, the charges were more important.

“I know it's only two, but not only do I take heart in the fact that these two people were both convicted of murder, but I’ve received countless messages from people inside who have taken, believe it or not, a degree of comfort in this,” he said.

According to Zeidman, aging New Yorkers convicted of murder – some of whom claim they were wrongfully convicted and others who don’t – began to grow concerned last year that there would be very few to no opportunities for them to escape their sentences, some of which span half a century or longer and were handed out when the defendant was a teenager or young adult.

“Although it's only two people, it is an action that is reverberating across the prisons,” Zeidman said. “That's where I do think it's significant.”

“Hopefully, it portends not only that the governor is going to continue considering people convicted of homicide but that the numbers of grants will increase,” he added.

Among those granted clemency on Friday was Yohannes Johnson, a 67-year-old man convicted of murder and robbery as a 24-year-old in 1982.

As of this year, Johnson, who was a client of Zeidman’s clinic, has served 43 years of the 75-year to life sentence he received when he was a young man in Brooklyn. Under his original sentence, he wouldn’t have been eligible for parole until 2055, at the age of 99.

According to Jose DiLenola, the clemency campaign director for the Release Aging People in Prison Campaign, Johnson, who is a member of the organization, has changed his life throughout his more than four decades in prison.

“He exemplifies the capacity for human beings, including those convicted of serious harm, to change our lives and be a positive force in our communities,” DiLenola said in a statement.

DiLenola also called on Hochul to grant clemencies at a faster clip than she has since taking office.

This year, her office has granted 13 of the 248 clemency applications sent to the governor this year – of those applications, 194 were for sentence commutations and 54 were for pardons.

Overall, there are 1,205 commutation applications and 480 pardon applications pending with the governor, a majority of which were submitted before Hochul took office. The governor’s office did not provide the Eagle with the number of applications that have been rejected this year, despite promising to release those numbers with each round of granted clemencies in 2021.

“While we are elated for Mr. Johnson, his loved ones, and the other clemency recipients, we know that there are many other Yohannes Johnsons in prison,” DiLenola said. “They are men, women, and people outside of the gender binary who are ready to come home.”

Though Johnson’s sentence commutation does not mean he’ll immediately be released from prison, it will allow him to plead his case for release before the parole board, which will make a determination about whether or not he’s suitable for parole.

So too will be the case for Jermaine Swaby, a 41-year-old who was convicted of murder in 2002 at the age of 19 and who was granted clemency by Hochul on Friday.

Swaby has served around 22 and a half years of his 25-year to life sentence. He would not have been eligible for parole until 2026.

According to court records, Swaby claimed during his trial that he was acting in self defense as a teen when she shot and killed Shane Reynolds outside of a Brooklyn nightclub.

Gothamist reported that while incarcerated, Swaby earned his GED, helped others conduct legal research and led discussions about peaceful conflict resolution.

“The clemency process requires intense deliberation and consultation with law enforcement, prosecutors, victims’ rights advocates, applicants and other stakeholders,” Hochul said in a statement. “My administration has implemented significant reforms to strengthen the clemency process and we are committed to continuing those efforts."

Following the first round of clemencies Hochul granted in 2021, the governor committed to a series of reforms to the process, many of which advocates had been calling for for years.

Included among those reforms was a new advisory board dedicated to reviewing applications and making clemency recommendations to the governor – those duties were previously carried out by a group of executive office staffers.

Hochul’s office also began informing those with pending applications about the status of their bid for clemency and have provided new detailed guidance on how to submit a clemency application.

But the largest reform – and also one of the last to be implemented by the governor’s office – was a promise to grant clemencies on a rolling basis, rather than just at the end of the year during the holiday season.

Hochul first began granting clemency outside of the holiday season last April, when she granted clemency to seven people. In September, she granted clemency to 13 people. She granted an additional 16 clemencies in December of last year.

The governor’s office did not respond to questions about the coming year’s schedule for granting clemencies, or even if there is one.