Gov. Jerry Brown grants 63 more pardons
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SACRAMENTO -- Gov. Jerry Brown’s office announced pardons of 63 criminals on Friday, tying the clemency decisions to Good Friday.
They follow 314 pardons released at Christmas and Easter since Brown resumed office in 2011.
The list includes Clark Guest, who was 38 when convicted of stealing from his landlord in the 1990s to support a drug addiction.
Guest now supervises drug addiction clinics for the San Luis Obispo courts, the very same program he went through as an offender and that he credits for saving his life then.
[Updated 5 p.m. April 18: “I’ve been waiting 14 years for this call ... this just blows me away,” he said Friday after being notified by the governor’s office of his pardon. It follows the certificate of rehabilitation he received in 2010 from a San Louis Obispo judge.
Clemency was personally important, Guest said, “because it completes a journey I’ve been on. I was raised well, and I went off track.
“Good people make mistakes, and we’re allowed to make U turns.”]
The pardon signed by Brown cites Guest’s “good moral character” and his conduct “as a law-abiding citizen.”
The governor’s pardons also include a Texas-based airline pilot last year honored by the FAA for his safety record who had spent one year in jail for transporting a controlled substance in 1990, and a Los Angeles man who spent six months in jail for attempting to evade police trying to give him a ticket a decade ago. He wants to reenlist in the National Guard.
For the most part, those receiving pardons were involved in minor drug crimes. Some had petitioned prior governors for years to have their rights restored, clearing the way to own guns or hold jobs from which felons are otherwise excluded.
However, one man robbed a convenience store, two people committed welfare fraud, one was involved in a lethal knife fight and a Santa Clara County man killed someone while driving drunk.
Govs. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Gray Davis and Pete Wilson combined granted 29 pardons over 20 years.
You can see a list of recent pardons here.
Brown grants 127 Christmas pardons
Firefighter on Brown’s pardon list cited for heroism
twitter: @paigestjohn
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