Click here for printer-friendly version

Welcome to the Clemency home page hosted by The Criminal Justice Policy Foundation (CJPF). This website is the first comprehensive, nationwide database providing information on clemency and commutation of sentence. It gives state prisoners (and their attorneys, families and friends) the basic information they need to apply to the Governor or other proper authority of the state where a prisoner is housed to get an early release from prison through a commutation of sentence. It provides samples of the actual forms required by the states where they are available.

CJPF has been working for reform of sentencing laws since 1989. The focus of its work in sentencing has been to reform the Federal mandatory minimum sentences. We work closely with Families Against Mandatory Minimums.

In 2000, CJPF organized hundreds of clergy around the country – the Coalition for Jubilee Clemency (CJC) – to appeal to President Bill Clinton to use his constitutional power to commute the sentences of deserving low-level, non-violent drug offenders who had been sentenced to excessively long sentences. This campaign helped create the political climate that encouraged President Clinton to commute almost two dozen low-level drug offenders. The Court TV movie Guilt By Association features the CJC campaign to reduce sentences. The coalition is now targeting President George W. Bush. But as large as the Federal prison population has grown, from 25,000 in the 1970s to 40,000 in 1986 to 178,000 now, it is still much smaller than the total population in state prisons.

More than two million persons are being held in prisons and jails convicted of state criminal charges. The cost of housing these prisoners has grown enormously. The nation’s adult correctional budget in FY 2002 exceeded $40 billion -- in FY 1992, the budgets totaled only $19.3 billion. These correctional costs are also absorbing large amounts of total state expenditures. In FY 2002, the average state’s correctional costs were 3.6% of total state expenditures.

Every state has granted the Governor or some other agency some power to commute the sentences or to parole persons sentenced to prison. Each state has different procedures. Sometimes the procedures of a state are very clearly spelled out; other times they are ambiguous.

The information on this website is the best we could provide, but it is not a substitute for actually contacting the Governor’s office, the State Parole Board or other appropriate agency. These procedures are subject to change without notification to us. The information on this site is not legal advice and is not a substitute for consulting with an attorney or qualified and experienced paraprofessional.

Eric E. Sterling