Chris Goldstein pardoned by President Biden for weed-smoking protests inquirer.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from inquirer.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Pardonnez-moi? Tiger King sues White House pardon office
Share on Facebook
Ed MorrisseyPosted at 11:49 am on December 17, 2020
Share on Facebook
Share on Twitter
Everyone knows that the presidency has plenary authority under the Constitution to issue pardons and commutations. Given that, it also follows that the presidency has the plenary authority to reject clemency applications. But does a president have the plenary authority to
ignore such applications and can a president delegate that screening task to others in the executive branch?
The answers seems rather obviously to be
yes, but Joe Exotic has a lot of time on his hands … twenty-two years of it, in fact. That sentence for the Tiger King’s plot to kill rival and critic Carole Baskin is precisely why he wants a pardon. And Maldonado-Passage has filed suit to force the Office of Pardons to pass his application to Donald Trump:
In this Aug. 28, 2013, file photo, the late Joseph Maldonado-Passage, also known as Joe Exotic, answers a question during an interview at the zoo he runs in Wynnewood, Okla. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki)
FORT WORTH, Texas (CN) Imprisoned “Tiger King” docuseries star Joe Exotic sued the Justice Department Wednesday, disputing a rejection of his pardon application because it was not presented directly to President Donald Trump.
Joseph Maldonado-Passage, 57, sued the U.S. Office of the Pardon Attorney in federal court in Fort Worth. He is currently an inmate at the nearby Federal Medical Center Fort Worth.
He was convicted in 2019 on two counts of murder-for-hire, eight counts of violating the Lacey Act for falsifying wildlife records and nine counts of violating the Endangered Species Act.