Forgiving Huckabee

Former presidential candidate Mike Huckabee pardoned Maurice Clemmons, the man police are searching for following the shooting deaths of four officers in a Seattle suburb on Sunday. The pardon for Clemmons, who was convicted at the age of 17 for aggravated robbery, took place in 2000 when Huckabee was governor of Arkansas.

Huckabee commuted Clemmons' 95-year prison sentence.

He granted numerous clemencies during his time as governor, stirring controversy during his 2008 campaign for the Republican presidential nomination. The Associated Press in 2007 calculated that Huckabee granted a clemency once every four days while in office, a rate greater than his peers. Among pardons were one for Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards (a traffic offense) and one for Whitewater witness David Hale, who was expected to serve three weeks in jail for an insurance case. Hale's testimony had helped provoke the resignation of state Gov. Jim Guy Tucker, Huckabee's predecessor.

Police in the Seattle area continue their frenzied search for Clemmons.

After his release from prison in Arkansas, Clemmons was put back behind bars in July 2001 for a parole violation, then released in March of 2004, according to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. In Washington state, he got into trouble again. But facing eight felony charges, according to The Seattle Times, he was released from the Peirce County Jail roughly a week ago, after posting $150,000 in bail with the assistance of a bondsman.

Clemmons is suspected of entering a coffee house and firing on four Lakewood, Wash., officers, killing them -- Sgt. Mark Renninger, Ronald Owens, Tina Griswold, and Greg Richards.

Huckabee issued a statement in the wake of the slayings:

"The senseless and savage execution of police officers in Washington State has saddened the nation, and early reports indicate that a person of interest is a repeat offender who once lived in Arkansas and was wanted on outstanding warrants here and Washington State. The murder of any individual is profound tragedy, but the murder of a police officer is the worst of all murders in that it is an assault on every citizen and the laws we live within.

Should he be found to be responsible for this horrible tragedy, it will be the result of a series of failures in the criminal justice system in both Arkansas and Washington State. He was recommended for and received a commutation of his original sentence from 1990, making him parole eligible and was paroled by the parole board once they determined he met the conditions at that time. He was arrested later for parole violation and taken back to prison to serve his full term, but prosecutors dropped the charges that would have held him. It appears that he has continued to have a string of criminal and psychotic behavior but was not kept incarcerated by either state. This is a horrible and tragic event and if found and convicted the offender should be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law. Our thoughts and prayers are and should be with the families of those honorable, brave, and heroic police officers."

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