Barack Obama
President Barack Obama on Dec. 17 pardoned an Oregon Marine convicted of stealing military property and reduced the 30-year sentence of a Portland woman sent to prison nearly a decade ago on methamphetamine charges.
(The Associated Press)
President Barack Obama on Wednesday pardoned an Oregon Marine convicted of stealing military property and reduced the 30-year sentence of a Portland woman sent to prison nearly a decade ago on methamphetamine charges.
The two were among 20 people granted clemency by Obama in the most recent round, bringing the total to 82 during his administration and the only ones from Oregon, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Obama pardoned David R. Mannix, 47, of Lafayette, who was sentenced in 1990 during a Marine Corps court martial to 75 days of confinement and had his rank reduced for stealing military property.
A message left at a number listed for Mannix was not immediately returned.
Obama commuted the sentence of Barbara L. Scrivner, 48, who in July 1995 was sent to federal prison for 30 years for conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine, possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine and methamphetamine distribution. Her sentence is now set to end in June 2015.
Scrivner was one of seven people, including her husband, convicted for their involvement in a meth drug ring. Prison terms ranged from five years to life in prison.
The group bought and made meth in at least four rundown Southeast Portland homes and another in Milwaukie, prosecutors said. After cooking the drugs several times, they would have the homes cleaned, then sold or rented, unbeknownst to the person moving in, according to prosecutors.
The group manufactured nearly 700 pounds of meth, prosecutors said.
Defense attorneys blasted the lengthy prison sentences because investigators seized less than an ounce of meth and built their case around receipts, records and testimony about several purchases of chemicals used to create the drugs.
In a February 2006 letter, Senior U.S. District Judge Ancer Haggerty said he had no objection to Scrivner being considered for a commutation because sentencing guidelines were no longer mandatory.
"If you were before me today for sentencing, I would probably consider your range to be in the 10 to 15 year range," he wrote.
The other pardons announced Wednesday by the White House were for theft, drug- and fraud-related cases with original sentences that ranged from one year of probation to five years in prison. The commutations were for federal drug-related convictions in Alabama, Virginia, Tennessee, Missouri, Iowa and Texas that ranged from 10 years to life in prison.
-- Everton Bailey Jr.