Page 6 - Florida Sentinel 6-7-16 Online Edition

White House And U.S. Military News
President Will Commute 42 More Federal Sentences
President Obama Mourns Muhammad Ali
WASHINGTON — Presi- dent Barack Obama will commute the sentence of 42 federal prisoners on Friday.
President Obama has now issued 348 commutations — more than the amount issued by the past seven presidents com- bined — though advocates have encouraged him to be even bolder.
In addition to using the power of commutation more freely than past presidents, the Pres- ident has also focused his ef- forts on a certain subset of federal prisoner: people with drug offenses who face dispro- portionately long sentences. Among the 42 people who re- ceived commutations on Friday, nearly half (20) were serving life sentences. Of his 348 career commutations, 130 were in prison for life.
In a blog post on last Friday, White House lead counsel Neil Eggleston said the President “remains committed to using his clemency power throughout the remainder of the Adminis- tration to give more deserving individuals that same second chance.” But he added that leg- islation from Congress would be needed to “bring about lasting change to the federal system.”
“There remain thousands of men and women in federal prison serving sentences longer than necessary, often due to overly harsh mandatory mini- mum sentences,” Eggleston said.
Even without such legislation, some had expected President Obama to have done even
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA
more by this point in his presi- dency. When former Pardon At- torney Deborah Leff stepped down earlier this year, she wrote in her resignation letter that the Justice Department had not dedicated adequate re- sources to the clemency initia- tive.
Former Attorney General Eric Holder told The Wash- ington Post he initially believed as many as 10,000 federal pris- oners could be released under the initiative. The number of prisoners who meet the criteria is now believed to be between 1,000 and 2,000.
Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates said Friday that she was “confident that there will be many more commuta- tions in the months to come.”
Many of the people who did receive commutations on Friday will be getting out of prison in October, although some are set to be released next year or in 2018. Nearly all had been sen- tenced for drug offenses, with the vast majority convicted for the distribution of crack co- caine.
President Barack Obama
offered his condolences Satur- day on the death of Muham- mad Ali, joining millions of Americans in recalling how the fighter inspired him.
"Like everyone else on the planet, Michelle and I mourn his passing," the President said in a statement. "But we're also grateful to God for how for- tunate we are to have known him, if just for a while; for how fortunate we all are that The Greatest chose to grace our time."
President Obama called Ali's wife, Lonnie, to tell her how fortunate he was to have met the former champion and that the worldwide mourning showed how remarkable his life was, a White House spokes- woman said.
President Obama said he keeps a pair of Ali's gloves on display in his White House study, under the iconic 1965 photograph of a 22-year-old Ali standing over a fallen Sonny
Liston.
He shook up the world, and the world's better for it. Rest in peace, Champ.
"I was too young when it was taken to understand who he was — still Cassius Clay, al- ready an Olympic Gold Medal winner, yet to set out on a spir- itual journey that would lead him to his Muslim faith, exile him at the peak of his power, and set the stage for his return to greatness with a name as fa-
miliar to the downtrodden in the slums of Southeast Asia and the villages of Africa as it was to cheering crowds in Madison Square Garden," Obama said
"'I am America,' he once de- clared," the president contin- ued. "'I am the part you won't recognize. But get used to me — Black, confident, cocky; my name, not yours; my religion, not yours; my goals, my own. Get used to me.' That's the Ali IcametoknowasIcameofage — not just as skilled a poet on the mic as he was a fighter in the ring, but a man who fought for what was right. A man who fought for us."
The President added: "He wasn't perfect, of course. For all his magic in the ring, he could be careless with his words, and full of contradictions as his faith evolved. But his wonderful, in- fectious, even innocent spirit ultimately won him more fans than foes — maybe because in him, we hoped to see something of ourselves."
9 Fort Hood Soldiers Die In Texas Flooding; 2 Were From Florida
The death toll in a tragic flooding accident at Fort Hood climbed to nine Friday after search and rescue crews recov- ered the bodies of the service members who went missing when fast-moving Texas flood- waters swept away their truck Thursday. Three soldiers sur- vived the tragedy.
Pfc. Zachary Fuller
Pvt. Eddy Gates Pfc. Brandon Ban- was a former home-
The deadly accident took
place Thursday morning. The from soldiers were conducting small- Florida. unit convoy operations training
when their vehicle overturned
at Owl Creek with 12 soldiers on
board. Three were rescued by
other soldiers in another vehi-
cle following, officials said. The
bodies of three others were re-
covered downstream. The re-
maining six soldiers were
recovered after a massive
search that stretched into Fri-
day. Most of the soldiers be-
longed to 3rd Battalion, 16th
Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd
Armored Brigade Combat
Team, 1st Cavalry Division.
was an
Cadet Mitchell Winey
army brat
Milton, coming queen from N.C.
Palmetto, ner of Florida.
The 12 soldiers were on a training exercise.
Several of them were young — privates with less than a year of active-duty military service. One was still a cadet, scheduled to graduate from West Point in two years.
Officials at Fort Hood, where the soldiers were based, have described the incident as a "tragedy," and over the week- end, biographies of the victims began to emerge.
Palmetto, FL native, PFC. Zachery Fuller was a 23- year-old military brat who just wanted to follow in his parents footsteps.
Also among the dead is Pfc. Brandon Austin Banner, 22, of Milton, Florida.
Eddy Gates, a 20-year-old
private from North Carolina, was a homecoming queen who "worked to help people," ac- cording to her mother.
Cadet Mitchell Winey, 21, an Indiana native and engi- neering management major who West Point described in a statement as "a rising leader in his class."
Private Tysheena James, 21, arrived from Jersey City, a high school track runner who, her mother said had "so much to live for."
Christine Armstrong was a 27-year-old private from Cal- ifornia who, after moving to Texas two years ago, regularly updated old friends on her new life.
Miguel Angel Colonva- zquez was the oldest of the group. A 38-year-old staff ser-
Staff Sgt. Miguel Angel Colonvazquez.
geant from Brooklyn, did two
tours in Iraq, and also in Afghanistan twice, with his most recent tour ending two years ago.
Pvt. Isaac Lee Deleon, 19, and Yingming Sun, 25 were also among the soldiers that did not survive.
Authorities were still investi- gating the incident, which oc- curred during the wettest three months in Texas history.
Pvt. Tysheena James
Pvt. Christine Armstrong
PAGE 6 FLORIDA SENTINEL BULLETIN PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY AND FRIDAY TUESDAY, JUNE 7, 2016