CLINTON EXAMINES CLEMENCY CASES

President Clinton is considering whether to offer clemency to scores
of low-level drug offenders, raising the possibility that one of his
last acts in office could be the broadest grant of clemency since
presidents Ford and Carter pardoned thousands of Vietnam-era draft
evaders more than two decades ago.

The White House has been tight-lipped about what Clinton might do,
but officials indicated Thursday that a decision could come as early
as Friday.

Several groups are trying to persuade the president to release some
low-level drug offenders - perhaps as many as several hundred -
before he leaves office, saying that their sentences were far too
harsh.

Clinton gave them hope during a recent interview with Rolling Stone
magazine, in which he hinted that he might act dramatically to
shorten the five-, 10- and 20-year sentences of some non-violent drug
offenders. Clinton said drug sentencing policies should be
re-examined.

"The sentences in many cases are too long for non-violent offenders,"
he said, adding that it was "unconscionable" to punish crack cocaine
offenders - more than 90% of whom are black - much more harshly than
powder cocaine offenders, who are more likely to be white.

The Constitution gives the president the authority to commute
sentences and pardon those convicted of federal crimes. But in the
last 20 years, presidents seldom have used that power.

About 58% of the USA's 146,640 federal prisoners are drug offenders,
many serving long mandatory sentences.

"There is no question that the timing is better than it has been in a
long, long time for having these cases considered for clemency," says
Margaret Love, the Justice Department's pardon attorney from 1990 to
1997.

Three major efforts advocating clemency for low-level drug offenders
are underway:

A group called Families Against Mandatory Minimums has screened
hundreds of cases and chosen a dozen inmates it considers to be prime
candidates for having their sentences commuted. "It was an awful
proposition because we had to pass over so many worthy cases," says
Julie Stewart, president of the group. "We picked cases that the
pardon office was most likely to look on favorably" - felons whose
cases did not involve guns, those who have served large chunks of
their sentences, and those whose co-defendants played a bigger role
in the crime but received shorter sentences.

The Coalition for Jubilee Clemency, a group of 675 clergy members,
has asked Clinton to grant clemency to all low-level, non-violent
drug offenders who have served five or more years in prison. Another
group, the November Coalition in Colville, Wash., has collected
32,000 signatures on a petition seeking the early release of the same
type of felons targeted by the Jubilee group. In 1994, Congress
passed a "safety valve" law that let nonviolent drug offenders avoid
mandatory minimum sentences and be sentenced based on the federal
sentencing guidelines. However, the policy was not made retroactive.

Families Against Mandatory Minimums has supplied the White House with
a list of the 487 inmates who meet the "safety valve" rules but were
sentenced before 1994. If Clinton were to commute those sentences,
about 350 inmates would be released immediately. The rest would get
out in the next few years.

Phillip Gaines, 16, of Mobile, Ala., says he is optimistic that his
mother, Dorothy, will be freed by the president.

Dorothy Gaines, who is on the FAMM group's list of top clemency
candidates, is in the sixth year of a 19-year sentence she received
for being a minor player in a big crack cocaine ring.

She was convicted of letting a boyfriend keep crack in her house, and
she received a longer sentence than the boyfriend (who has been
released from prison) and the drug ring's leader, who is scheduled to
be released in 2004.

After her conviction, her son's life went into a downward spiral.
Phillip's grades tumbled; he's been held back two years in school and
is in the eighth grade. His older sister dropped out of college to
take care of him and another sister.

"My sister tries to be my mother, but nobody can be a mom like a mom," he says.

"I feel sorry for Dorothy Gaines," says U.S. Attorney Don Foster,
chief federal prosecutor in Mobile. "I feel sorry for her children.
But it's not a question of sympathy. It's a question of enforcing the
laws as written by Congress. She was fairly treated relative to other
people in her position."

Arthur Curry, a Maryland educator, has a son whom inmate advocates
see as another leading candidate for clemency. Derrick Curry was
arrested for a crack offense at 19, is now 30 and is scheduled for
release at age 40.

"I will be very grateful if my son is granted clemency," Arthur Curry
says. "But I have a hard time answering the question: Why my son and
not someone's else's? There are a lot of Derrick Currys in (prison).
They are not monsters. They are kids who made mistakes."