Summary
Two federal death row inmates, Shannon Agofsky and Len Davis, are challenging President Joe Biden’s commutation of their death sentences to life without parole.
They argue the commutations harm their legal appeals, stripping them of heightened judicial scrutiny and legal counsel access.
Agofsky is contesting convictions for a 1989 murder and a 2001 prison killing, while Davis, a former police officer, was convicted for orchestrating the 1994 murder of a civil rights complainant.
Biden’s clemency, excluding three high-profile cases, commuted 37 federal death row sentences, a historic number.
My guess is that accepting that also means admitting to the alleged crimes. Both of these people seem to want to be proven innocent rather than guilty but not set for execution.
Edit: I did no research on either case nor know if I am correct.
- There’s this idea going around that accepting a pardon is an admission of guilt. This is false and there is a court decision saying so.
- This is a commutation, not a pardon.
If you’re referring to Burdick, then you have it backwards. Burdick explicitly states that a pardon carries an “imputation of guilt” and that accepting the pardon is “a confession to it”.
