Don’t let Bevin’s pardons slime the legislature’s important work on criminal justice reform
Delmar Partin was convicted of murdering Betty Carnes, chopping off her head and stuffing her body in a 55-gallon drum.
The thing is that it’s possible he didn’t do it, something that might have been proven if the DNA technology was available in 1993. That’s why former Gov. Matt Bevin commuted his sentence and pardoned him without telling Carnes’ family. That’s also the real conundrum that Bevin put us in: He took one of a governor’s most sacred trusts — the power of clemency — and used it in his typically arrogant and high-handed way so the power itself and the very good things he did with it are forever slimed in the minds of Kentuckians. Because he didn’t bother to tell prosecutors and victims’ families about the pardons, because he did it without deeply explaining why, he alienated a huge swathe of people across the Commonwealth.
And that’s not the only place his actions left a stain. He’s probably ruined any hope of comprehensive criminal justice reform this legislative session. In the midst of this public outrage over pardoning murderers and rapists, it seems to me it would be very difficult for many law and order legislators to sign on to changes to put fewer people in prison. Even if it makes a lot of sense.
That worry was first voiced last week by Sen. Julie Raque Adams, R-Louisville, at the Chamber of Commerce legislative preview.
“These pardons have been controversial to say the least, and I think that it’s really broken that level of trust with people,” she told me. “I’m worried that lack of trust will translate into maybe not moving forward with some creative ideas on criminal justice reform.”
Adams noted that the power of pardons can be to correct wrongs in the justice system or recognize rehabilitation.
“... I think when used judiciously, it many times can correct wrongs the system has inflicted on people, but it’s been so egregiously used, that now people don’t trust that government is looking out for them as far as keeping them safe. Because of what he did we will have to work to create that trust again.”
(Bevin isn’t helping anything by popping up like a malevolent Jiminy Cricket every chance he gets to defend himself. On Thursday he told a radio station that he pardoned a man convicted of child sexual abuse because “their hymens were intact.)
David Menschel, an attorney and national criminal justice activist in Portland, Ore., said clemency power used to be used more frequently by governors in the 1970s, but by the 1990s, it had dropped off in the era of Willie Horton and other political fear-mongering.
“I think obviously it would be better to do it in a way that’s respectful to victims, but victims can be respected and rehabilitation can be recognized at the same time,” he said. “Those things are not incompatible.”
Sen. Whitney Westerfield, R-Hopkinsville, who chairs the Judiciary Committee said that while there is some fatigue around criminal justice reform, he hopes individual pieces like bail reform can move forward. He said that Administrative Office of the Courts reported that as of Dec. 1, the state was holding 7,317 people charged with low-level drug and property offenses who can’t make bail, but are part of the dangerously overcrowded prison and jail system.
“Those are almost all related to feeding a drug habit, and they aren’t being served in custody,” he said.
Westerfield also said that the few high-profile cases that have made headlines have overshadowed the more than 300 pardons Bevin made of low-level drug offenders.
“It’s crowding out the really positive note of a slew of pardons for people who served time and made amends and that is unfortunate,” he said.
It is indeed. Hopefully, thoughtful legislators from both sides of the aisle can come together to fix the most broken pieces of our system.