LAMAR ROBERSON, SENTENCED TO
LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE FOR SELLING
CRACK, WAS RELEASED EARLIER
THIS YEAR. “I’M JUST ENJOYING
LIFE AND BEING FREE,” HE SAYS.
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P R O B ONO
BY SUSAN BECK
Finally Free
The aim of the Clemency Project was to get low-level drug offenders who served
significant time released from prison. Some 70 firms participated. Was it a success?
and spending time with his family. “I’m just enjoying life and
tional Institution at Estill, South Carolina, was passing time
being free.”
in his unit on Dec. 18 when he was told to go to the warRoberson’s release is one of the limited triumphs of Clemden’s office. He had served 25 years behind bars, having been
ency Project 2014, an unprecedented collective effort by the
sentenced to life without parole for selling crack. The warprivate bar to represent federal inmates seeking clemency unden put him on the phone with Amber Shushan, his attorney.
der an initiative announced by the Obama administration in
Shushan told him that the clemency petition that Sutherland,
April 2014. (Roberson’s legal team was led by a former presAsbill & Brennan had filed on his behalf had been successful.
ident of the Georgia State Bar, Charles Lester Jr., a retired
He would be going home soon.
Sutherland partner.) This program offers the possibility of an
“If you could see a grown man shed tears,” says Roberson,
early release for nonviolent, low-level offenders without ties
recalling his reaction. On February 16, he walked out of pristo gangs or organized crime who served at least 10 years and
on to restart his life with his wife of 28 years, Caroline, their
behaved well in prison. Applicants must also show that they
four children and two grandchildren in Savannah. Roberson
probably would have gotten a lower sentence if convicted togot a job at Savannah’s Savage, Turner & Pinckney, hired by
day. Roberson, for example, would likely have been sentenced
the lawyer who defended him back when he was convicted.
to 20 years had he been convicted of the same crime now.
“He’s always had a good heart,” says Brent Savage. “He would
The American Bar Association, the American Civil Libersend me Christmas cards from prison.” Roberson’s responsities Union and three other civil rights groups came together
bilities include serving subpoenas and various office chores.
to create Clemency Project 2014. Billed as the largest pro
In early June he went to the home of a paraplegic client to
bono project ever, it has harnessed the efforts of more than
help the man get to his deposition.
4,000 lawyers, who include attorneys from more
“I’ve got a lot of people counting on me to
than 70 large firms, as well as solos and smallmake it. I won’t let them down,” says Roberson,
er firms, according to the project. Twenty-two
PHOTOGRAPH BY
MEGHAN NEWSOM
now 56. “Everything’s working out lovely.” In his
firms in The Am Law 200 listed it as one of their
spare time he’s been building a fence in his yard
top pro bono projects last year: Ballard Spahr has
LAMAR ROBERSON, A PRISONER AT THE FEDERAL CORREC-
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PR O B ON O
committed 7,400 hours in the last two years; Wilmer Cutler
The White House points out that the president has comPickering Hale & Dorr has devoted 6,540 lawyer hours and
muted the sentences of more individuals than the past seven
700 hours of paralegal support; DLA Piper and Kirkland &
presidents combined. A senior Justice Department official
Ellis each contributed more than 3,000 hours last year alone.
maintains that this initiative is a priority for Yates, who can
Despite this valiant commitment, Clemency Project 2014
assign limited resources to the program under budget aphas had only modest success. Out of 36,000 inmates who
propriation rules. That official, who would talk only without
asked the project for help, just 111 have had their sentences
being named, also argues that the backlog numbers are miscommuted as of mid June. More than double that number got
leading: The government has prioritized identifying successtheir sen­tences commuted by representing themselves pro se
ful petitions, putting aside those that are clearly not eligible
or by getting help from other groups such as law school clinwithout processing them, the official says. In addition, many
ics. In total, President Obama has granted clemency to 347
petitioners have gotten sentences reduced outside the clempeople through his initiative.
ency initiative, as the Sentencing Commission in 2014 retIn May—with the clock ticking on the effort, which is exroactively changed certain sentencing rules. (Roberson was
pected to expire with Obama’s term—the Clemency Project
among them. Shortly before his clemency petition was apsent letters to more than 1,000 prisoners who still didn’t have
proved, his sentence was reduced to 30 years.)
a lawyer, telling them that the project was trying to find them
Marjorie Peerce, a partner at Ballard Spahr who serves
representation, but that they should consider filing a petion the steering committee of Clemency Project 2014 and
tion on their own. Clemency Project 2014 executive director
whose firm has won three clemency grants, says she’s proud
Cynthia Roseberry, who says they’re still looking for lawyers,
of the project’s accomplishments. “Every single person who
notes that volunteers have encountered significant obstacles,
is released from prison gives me great pleasure,” says the
such as problems tracking down decades-old client records
white-collar defense lawyer. “I applaud the president and
that exist only on paper.
the Justice Department for finally realizing that sentencing
To its credit, the project reports that it screened more
practices were just insane.”
than 30,000 inmate requests and subThe experience was life altering not
mitted more than 1,100 clemency petionly for the prisoners. Nearly every lawSTANDOUT SUPPORTERS OF
tions. (The vast majority of prisoners
yers interviewed for this article got teary
THE CLEMENCY PROJECT
were deemed ineligible for clemency;
or choked up when describing how they
1. Alston & Bird
many, for example, had some history of
told their clients they would be freed.
violence.) Thirty-four of those petitions
“It was one of the most memorable
2. Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell &
Berkowitz
have been denied while more than 800
experiences of my career,” says Sean
3. Ballard Spahr
are pending.
Hecker, a white-collar defense partMark Osler, a sentencing expert and
ner at Debevoise & Plimpton, recalling
4. Blank Rome
professor at the University of St. Thomas
the moment he called his client David
5. Bryan Cave
School of Law in Minneapolis, estimates
Padilla to tell him his life sentence for
6. Carlton Fields Jorden Burt
that roughly 5,000 inmates deserve to get
drug offenses had been commuted. Af7. Chapman and Cutler
clemency under the broader initiative.
ter Padilla’s release, Hecker and the rest
8. Crowell & Moring
The problem, he says, is multifaceted.
of the Debevoise team gathered for a
9. Debevoise & Plimpton
The government’s process for granting
celebratory lunch with Padilla and his
10. DLA Piper
clemency is too bureaucratic, he says.
family at a Philadelphia steak house. “It
11. Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson
And the U.S. Department of Justice’s
was an emotional experience,” says Pa12. Hughes Hubbard & Reed
Office of the Pardon Attorney, which redilla. “They really did an awesome job.
13. Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton
views clemency petitions, didn’t get the
My family is so grateful.” (Padilla, who
14. King & Spalding
resources it needed to process the petiearned certification as a dental technitions. Deborah Leff, the DOJ’s pardon
cian while in prison, is working the night
15. Kirkland & Ellis
attorney for most of this program, reshift cleaning and maintaining buses. He
16. Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel
signed in January in frustration, writing
hopes to get a job in the dental field.)
17. Manatt, Phelps & Phillips a stinging resignation letter criticizing
18. Perkins Coie
the lack of support from deputy attorney
ROADBLOCKS
19. Quarles & Brady
general Sally Yates.
“I have a lot of admiration for the people
20. Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom
The result has been a staggering backin CP 14, but I don’t think it was a great
21. Sutherland Asbill & Brennan
log. As of June 6, more than 11,861 petiidea,” says professor Osler, using the
22. Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr
tions were awaiting a decision, according
shorthand for the project. Osler, who asto the Office of the Pardon Attorney.
sisted with the group’s training, believes
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DAVID PADILLA AND HIS WIFE, LISETTE
SUAREZ, CENTER, WITH DEBEVOISE TEAM
INCLUDING SEAN HECKER (FAR LEFT), JEREMY
KLATELL, SARAH EVANS AND MARISA TANEY.
that it wasn’t the right vehicle to tackle this formidable task.
The project imposed multiple layers of review for each petition, which added more bureaucracy. Plus, he says, the vast
majority of the pro bono lawyers lacked criminal defense experience, which slowed the process.
Rachel Barkow, the faculty director of New York University
School of Law’s Center on the Administration of Criminal Law
and a member of the United States Sentencing Commission,
concurs. “I have a lot of sympathy for this herculean task” they
took on, she says. “If you’re not a federal criminal lawyer, it’s a
really steep learning curve. It’s definitely not an ideal model.”
Barkow, who emphasizes that she’s speaking for herself and not
as a member of the Sentencing Commission, suggests that law
school clinics staffed by students were a better fit for the task.
Clinics run by NYU have won clemency for eight inmates.
Clemency Project 2014 was hampered by a major problem
not of its making. The lawyers best-equipped to handle these
cases—public defenders and private criminal defense lawyers paid by the government to defend the indigent—were
deemed ineligible to work on the clemency initiative. The
DOJ had asked that those lawyers help review petitions for
the pardon attorney’s office, but in July 2014 the Administrative Office of the Courts issued a memorandum that those
lawyers couldn’t handle these cases while being paid by the
government, because there’s no Sixth Amendment right to
counsel for a clemency petition. “That was a surprise and really discouraging,” says Osler. “They were the biggest pot of
people who knew how to do this.”
Osler says that before the clemency initiative was announced, he and others tried to convince the administration to
create a program like President Gerald Ford’s
amnesty initiative in 1974 for Vietnam War draft
evaders. Then, a streamlined parole board independent of the Justice Department reviewed 25,000
cases in one year and gave clemency to 14,000. One
reason the program worked, Osler says, was that it
was outside the Justice Department. “Prosecutors
are not the people to consider mercy,” says Osler, a
former federal prosecutor.
“It’s Monday morning quarterbacking to say
the project didn’t do what it was supposed to do,”
counters Ballard Spahr’s Peerce. “Frankly, it gets
me upset. People expected us to pull a genie out of
the bottle. That’s not realistic.” She adds, “Rather
than criticizing big firms, I applaud them for stepping outside their comfort zone.”
Eugene Caiola, a counsel at Kilpatrick
Townsend in New York, ex­presses mixed feelings
about the Clemency Project. He’s thrilled that he helped win
clemency for Alphonso Morrison, who was facing a life sentence. But he also felt frustrated. “The way this project was
set up, it wasn’t particularly productive,” says Caiola, a real
estate transaction specialist. “You have people like me with no
criminal experience handling these cases.” Plus, he says, the
Office of the Pardon Attorney was understaffed. “Like many
things in government, it was a good idea beset by poor execution,” he says.
“You give hope to people who don’t have hope. You tell
them their sentence is unjust, and then nothing happens. It’s
like they’re being sentenced all over again.” Caiola adds, “Everybody who got involved did this with the best of intentions,
but you don’t want to do pro bono and be ineffective.”
For those 111 who have been released because of Clemency Project 2014, the effort was worth it. “The little freedom
I’ve got has been amazing,” says Angela LaPlatney of Casper,
Wyoming, whose 20-year sentence for drug possession was
commuted thanks to a Ballard Spahr team led by Salt Lake
City partner Blake Wade. LaPlatney is living in a halfway
house as she transitions out of prison and is working on a
cleaning crew at a Ramada Inn. She describes a recent visit
to Wal-Mart by herself as overwhelming. “It was a little intense,” she says, explaining that she could only buy two items
before she had to leave. “It might be better next time.”
LaPlatney adds, “I think what President Obama is doing is
wonderful. But there are so many people like me still serving
sentences.”
Email: [email protected].
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