A 48-year-old Connecticut drug lord who murdered a mother and her 8-year-old son to keep her from testifying against his brother will be released as part of former President Joe Biden’s pardon for about 2,500 federal inmates. received a pardon. It’s non-violent. ”
Bridgeport drug dealer Adrian Peeler killed a woman named Karen Clark and her 8-year-old son in a number of cases testifying against her brother, who is accused of shooting and killing Clark’s boyfriend in front of the children. Killed a week ago.
A mother and son were ambushed on their way home to their apartment in January 1999. Police found the boy with a bullet hole in the back of his head and Clark with gunshot wounds on the stairs, his outstretched hand inches from a phone. To CT post.
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Oswald Clark (left), brother of Karen Clark, is helped to the side of the casket by funeral home employee Kevin Mitchell during a service at Community Church of God in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, January 1999. 20th. (AP Photo/Wilfried Lee, File)
The alleged gunman, Peeler, served 25 years in state prison for conspiracy to commit murder, breaking the maximum charge of murder. He also took a plea deal on federal cocaine trafficking charges. After completing his sentence in Connecticut, he was transferred to a federal detention center to serve further time.
Peeler’s latest appeal was rejected in October last year, but he had previously persuaded a judge to reduce his sentence by 20 years, citing good behavior and the young age at which he committed the murders. He was supposed to be released in 2034.
Biden’s last-minute pardon also surprised Clark’s family.
“She’s sick, tired and fed up,” her brother Oswald Clark told The Associated Press. “It’s a very traumatic event. The family is very distraught over this. It’s like they’re being re-traumatized.”
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In this July 1, 2016 file photo, Russell Peeler Jr. speaks in Bridgeport Superior Court in Bridgeport, Connecticut. There, his younger brother Adrian Peeler, who was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release for ordering the murder of an 8-year-old, is the alleged shooter. (Ned Gerard/Hearst Connecticut Media, via AP, Pool, File)
On January 17, the White House boasted that Biden had issued more pardons and commutations “than any president in American history.”
“Today, I was convicted of a nonviolent drug crime and am serving a sentence disproportionately long compared to the sentence I would receive today under current laws, policies, and practices,” Biden said in a statement. “We will commute the sentences of approximately 2,500 people.”
Even Democratic Party officials seemed surprised by the move.
“It seems to me that someone dropped the ball here to get this person released,” Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal told the CT Post. . “This was a truly heinous murder case that changed our laws. It also highlights the need for us to consider how we can improve our pardon system.”
The newspaper said the murder prompted authorities in Connecticut to strengthen the state’s witness protection program, and authorities in Bridgeport named a park in Clark’s honor.
Complete list of Biden pardon and reduction recipients revealed
Peeler’s brother, Russell Peeler, was sentenced to death for ordering the murder, but his sentence was commuted to life in prison without parole after Connecticut abolished the death penalty.
Biden’s separately released list of “nonviolent” pardon recipients included many more violent criminals than just Peeler.
Two Virginia men serving life sentences in connection with a 1998 drug case that killed a Sussex County police officer were also released.
Ferrone Claiborne and Terrence Richardson, known as “Waverly Two,” both admitted their involvement in Officer Allen Gibson’s death, but were later acquitted of murder charges due to an apparent lack of evidence. It became. However, they were convicted on lesser charges and sentenced to life in prison anyway.
President Joe Biden attends a Department of Defense farewell ceremony at Joint Base Meyer-Henderson Hall in Arlington, Virginia, January 16, 2025. In his final days in office, he granted thousands of requests for clemency. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
Gibson, 25, stumbled upon a back alley drug deal involving Richardson and Claiborne in Waverly. Authorities said the two men attacked and disarmed the man. He was later found with a gunshot wound to his abdomen, just below his bulletproof vest.
Richardson pleaded guilty to a state charge of manslaughter and Claiborne pleaded guilty to a charge of being an accessory after the fact. They were then tried in federal court, and although prosecutors were unable to convince a jury of the murder charges, they were able to convict them on the drug trafficking charges.
In a statement released by Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares, Crissana Gibson, the slain police officer’s daughter, said she was “absolutely outraged by what happened.” “My heart was broken knowing that the men who killed my father would be released and free to walk the streets.”
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Apart from the “non-violent” sentence commutation, Biden also ignored the pleas of former FBI Director Christopher Wray to punish left-wing activist Leonard Wray, who was convicted for his role in an ambush that killed two FBI agents in South Dakota. ordered Pelletier’s release. 1975.
On his final day in office, he commuted Pelletier’s life sentence and granted last-minute pre-emptive pardons to his family and allies, including his brother, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Mark Milley and members of the Jan. 6 committee. . He previously pardoned his son Hunter.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
