Gov. Granholm releases prisoners at record rate

She has freed 124 -- including killers
 

BY DAWSON BELL
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER

Gov. Jennifer Granholm has freed 100 prisoners in the last two years -- including 55 last year -- and is on pace to commute more sentences than her three predecessors combined.

In all, she has granted 124 commutations -- all but seven coming after she ran for re-election in 2006.
 

Most of Granholm's early commutations were for medical reasons; none went to killers. But in the last two years, the former federal prosecutor and attorney general has freed dozens convicted of violent crimes -- including at least 38 in prison for murder.
 

That has prompted some victims' families to wonder about promises made long ago that the people who killed their loved ones would die in prison.
 

Granholm insisted that each commutation followed intense review and that the freed prisoners pose no threat to the safety of Michigan citizens. Most of the murderers were much older than when they entered state penitentiaries -- one spent nearly 48 years in prison.
 

"I am very focused," Granholm said Friday, on commuting only those who "pose no danger."
 

Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy disagrees, saying the process has been rushed, and conducted "under the cover of night."
 

When her office has expressed opposition to commutations, Worthy said, "I don't think they pay a lot of attention to what we say."
 

No one disputes that the governor's power of clemency is deadly serious. To date, none of Granholm's commutations have committed violent crimes after their release. But two murderers whose sentences were commuted by former Gov. William Milliken in the 1970s killed again -- one murdering three people and critically injuring two in a Detroit church.
 

Granholm said she was unaware of the case.
 

Former Gov. James Blanchard said last week that he still thinks about the six prisoners he released in his eight years in office.
 

"I worry to this day that one of those people I released will do something," he said.

Will state's freed killers kill again?

Granholm says she gives intense scrutiny to many factors before deciding to commute the sentence of a convicted felon.

Among them: the nature of the crime, the prisoner's age, health, prison record, remorse and his or her prospects on the outside.
 

"There is no hard and fast rule about who is in and who is out," Granholm said, discussing Friday the accelerating pace of commutations she has approved as she nears the end of her second and final term in office.
 

"I am very focused (on) making sure the commutations are for those who are likely to be successful on the outside, or at least pose no danger."
 

But there's the rub: No governor can be sure.

Former Gov. William Milliken, the last Michigan governor to issue a large number of commutations and an advocate for its continued use, got it right almost every time.

Except for James Ellis, an elderly convicted killer freed by Milliken who, eight years after his release, slaughtered three people and critically wounded two more in a shooting spree at a Detroit church in 1982.

Or John McRae, who Milliken approved for commutation in 1971, releasing him from a life sentence for the sexual mutilation and slaying of an 8-year-old boy in St. Clair Shores.

McRae moved to Florida, where authorities say he was responsible for the disappearance and death of three adolescent boys in the 70s. He was convicted of first-degree murder a second time in Michigan after the body of a 15-year-old neighbor was found buried under his old driveway near Clare. He died in prison in 2005.

Doug Baker, a former assistant prosecutor in Wayne County who convicted Ellis the second time around, said last week the governor's power of executive clemency is useful and necessary -- but potentially catastrophic.

"Somebody had determined that (Ellis) was a good bet," Baker said. "But a mistake was made, and lives were lost. I don't think there can be a guarantee of no risk of re-offending ... unless the person is on his deathbed when they let him go."

Granholm's heightened commutation activity began almost exclusively with approvals for prisoners with medical conditions that left them terminally ill or debilitated. Often the rationale for those decisions has been financial. State taxpayers pay for sick inmates -- on top of the cost of incarceration. But after they are released, the medical cost is usually borne by Medicaid, covered largely by federal dollars.

Sixty-one prisoners -- nearly half of those commuted by Granholm -- were considered medical commutations, according to the administration, although most are still alive.

After Granholm was re-elected in 2006, the administration stepped up efforts to put more cases in the commutation pipeline. In addition to the infirm, she has commuted dozens of drug sentences and released 15 foreign nationals set for deportation.

The screening process is painstaking and lengthy, Granholm said Friday, and she said she gets advice from sources inside and outside the prison system, including victims of crime and their families. On only one occasion -- that of a drug dealer set for deportation -- has Granholm approved a commutation not recommended by the state Parole Board.

That hasn't deterred increasingly restive law enforcement officials and prosecutors who believe the accelerated pace of commutations -- like the recent surge in the number of prisoners being paroled -- is reckless.

"We noticed quickly they were digging too deep," Attorney General Mike Cox said, accusing the administration of cutting corners to save money. An assistant attorney general attends each public hearing on a proposed commutation, often voicing opposition to release, especially during the past two years.

Similarly, some prosecutors in Michigan criticize what they describe as bureaucratic snafus at the Department of Corrections, or gaping holes in information about the circumstances of the original crime made available to the Parole Board or the governor.

Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said the MDOC failed to notify her office, as it is required to by law, in four instances when commutation was being considered for first-degree murderers. All four, including one man who committed a triple homicide in Detroit in 1976, were released. MDOC spokesman Russ Marlan said Friday that a review of the former inmates' files shows that, in each instance, Worthy's office received a certified notification letter about the hearings.

Granholm defended the department and Parole Board on Friday, and said the only time she considers the cost savings from a commutation is after all the conditions to assure public safety and justice are met.

Still, every potential commutation is unique, she said.

And potentially tragic.

"I believe the executive should retain the authority" to amend or eliminate criminal sentences, said Wayne County Judge Michael Sapala, who presided at the trial of Ellis. "But that kind of case really tests that belief."

"It's another example of the fallibility of human decision-making."

Contact DAWSON BELL: 517-372-8661 or dbell@freepress.com