Pardons and Fairness
Terry H. Schwadron
Aug. 6, 2021
We seem to be worried a lot lately about the appearance of justice — even more than its actual application to real lives.
For those engaging in the most partisan ways, there’s plenty of angst and outrage to go around. A lot of the disconcerted feelings have to do with perceptions about fairness — which helps explain the various glee and cringing over Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s demise over sexual harassment issues and dumbfounded-ness over the continuing insistence not to react to allegations of sexual abuse by Donald Trump (to say nothing of the ton of other legal abuses he seems to be facing). Joe Biden’s lone harassment complainant weighed in too, wondering about her complaint from 20 years ago.
In that context, consider the actions of Missouri Gov. Mike Parson this week, who announced a set of pardons that cleared the legal slate for a couple, both lawyers in their 60s, who gained notoriety over pointing guns at social justice demonstrators last year as they marched past the couple’s home near St. Louis.
Meet the McCloskeys
Parson, a Republican, pardoned Mark McCloskey, who pleaded guilty in June to misdemeanor fourth-degree assault and was fined $750, and Patricia McCloskey, who pleaded guilty to misdemeanor harassment and was fined $2,000. You may remember the well-publicized event from last summer when Mark McCloskey stood outside his home with an AR-15-style rifle, and Patricia McCloskey waved a semiautomatic pistol, making the couple either heroes or villains for seeming to threaten protesters passing on their way to a demonstration about police abuse against Black citizens following the death of George Floyd.
No shots were ever fired in the incident and no one was hurt. The local prosecutor had determined that the McCloskeys were never under threat themselves, which had been their claim. Because the charges were misdemeanors, the McCloskeys did not face the possibility of losing their dual law licenses or their rights to own firearms, though they did surrender the guns.
But it was a symbolic stand that stood for all that emotion-laden ball of self-defense, fear, racial tension, threat and what-is-America. Even Trump stood up publicly for their actions, and the couple was invited to speak by video at the Republican National Convention.
Add in that Mark McCloskey now is offering himself as a Republican candidate to replace outgoing Sen. Roy Blunt. You can see a question forming here about the state of justice in America, and clearing a guilty plea for a kindred political candidate.
Who Didn’t Get Pardons?
But wait, there is more.
Governor Parson issued 14 pardons last week, including the McCloskeys, But the governor took no action in the case of Kevin Strickland, a Black inmate serving a life sentence whom several prosecutors now say is innocent of a 1978 Kansas City triple homicide. Parson has said he’s not convinced Stickland is innocent.
Nor, as The Washington Post noted, was there action to free Lamar Johnson, another Black men who prosecutors say were wrongfully convicted and is serving a life sentence after a 1995 murder conviction that prosecutors say was the result of misconduct and fabrications from prosecutors and police.
Both cases have gotten a lot of local publicity, and now, they are being used by state Democrats to say that Governor Parson is using pardon powers in ways that are blatantly unfair, and favoring a political friend over any responsibilities to press for actual justice.
The governor’s office had had little to say other than noting that the Strickland case is not a priority. That is exactly what the critics here say, too, that Black men unfairly imprisoned should be prioritized over the fate of a couple facing no jail time.
“Missouri’s racist criminal justice system put two innocent black men (Kevin Strickland & Lamar Johnson) in prison, but the Gov chose to ignore them,” tweeted the Ethical Society of Police, an association founded by Black police officers in St. Louis.
Parson’s legal team has been working through a backlog of clemency requests.
Missouri’ House Democratic Minority Leader Crystal Quade said, “It is beyond disgusting that Mark and Patricia McCloskey admitted they broke the law and within weeks are rewarded with pardons, yet men like Kevin Strickland, who has spent more than 40 years in prison for crimes even prosecutors now say he didn’t commit, remain behind bars with no hope of clemency.”
Where’s the Justice?
The McCloskey’s lawyer, Joel Schwartz, told reporters, “Mark McCloskey has publicly stated that if he were involved in the same situation, he would have the exact same conduct. He believes that the pardon vindicates that conduct.”
That, of course, is not the point of pardons.
The McCloskeys were indicted by a grand jury in October on felony charges of the unlawful use of a weapon and evidence tampering. The charges were altered to give jurors the alternative of convictions of misdemeanor harassment instead of the weapons charge.
Because McCloskey is seeking the Senate seat, this incident will keep the McCloskeys in national Republican politics, and those of us wondering about justice amid politics have a new bite to keep chewing. McCloskey already is featuring pictures of himself brandishing a rifle outside his St. Louis mansion on his campaign website and social media.
We’re hearing more and more about political interference in the U.S. Justice Department during the Trump years, and all of it has a distinct odor of abusing the law for personal and political gain. We’re hearing plenty from Atty. Gen. Merrick Garland about leaning over backwards to defend his predecessors from legal actions specifically to blunt the idea that a Biden administration would seek to prosecute political opponents.
Trump turned even his own predecessors’ pardons over the years into a tool to reward his own personal political coterie, from Roger Stone and Paul Manafort to Michael Flynn. Committing crimes, even pleading guilty to crimes, apparently was less objectionable than political disloyalty, even in a Law & Order administration.
Cuomo (and lots of others, including former Sen. Al Franken) has lost the ability to stay in office and may face charges because of his allegations, but Trump apparently has not lost his claim to return to the White House and no one is supposed to question him? Why is Rep. Matt Gaetz fit to serve in Congress as he faces a variety of abuse charges involving minors — or conversely, if we’re waiting only on criminal charges, why are some pols out after the airing of allegations?
Once again, in Missouri, we are reminded that politics makes for bad pardons only if we care whether there is any justice being meted out.
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