Pubdate: Mon, 22 Jan 2001
Source: Salt Lake Tribune (UT)
Copyright: 2001 The Salt Lake Tribune
Contact:  143 S Main, Salt Lake City UT 84111
Fax: (801)257-8950
Website: http://www.sltrib.com/
Forum: http://www.sltrib.com/tribtalk/
Author: Shawn Foster

S.L. MAYOR HELPED UTAH WIN PRESIDENTIAL CLEMENCY

The Salt Lake County parents of a prisoner whose sentence was 
commuted were at the airport Sunday night to express thanks to the 
man they say was most responsible for their son's newfound freedom.

Burton and Carol Stringfellow say more than anybody else, Salt Lake 
City Mayor Rocky Anderson fought to get their son's 15-year drug 
sentence reduced.

"It's been the fulfillment of an impossible dream," said Burton 
Stringfellow, who greeted Anderson as the mayor returned from a 
Washington, D.C., lobbying effort. "It's been such a heavy burden 
lifted, and it was Rocky who stood up for Cory as if he was his own 
son."

Cory Stringfellow, 31, was among 35 inmates whose prison sentences 
were commuted by former President Clinton during his last hours in 
office.

Both Utah senators had lobbied on his behalf since the offense was 
nonviolent and occurred in Stringfellow's youth.

But for three years, the Stringfellows say, it was Anderson who waged 
a personal, and sometimes lonely, crusade against what they describe 
as unreasonably long prison terms for drug offenders.

That campaign continued last week as Anderson went to Washington, 
D.C., and publicly asked Clinton to grant clemency for Stringfellow 
and what might be hundreds of nonviolent drug offenders.

At a Washington news conference, Anderson said federal sentencing 
guidelines require severe punishments for minor drug violations. In a 
prepared statement, Anderson said presidential clemency could help to 
change those guidelines. According to Anderson's statement, "Many 
politicians excuse their earlier use of drugs as 'youthful 
indiscretions' --yet thousands of individual lives and families have 
been destroyed for making similar mistakes, and getting caught."

Anderson, who has publicly taken the war on drugs to task in his 
first year as mayor, was the main speaker at a news conference called 
by clergy, policy groups and parents of nonviolent drug offenders.

On Tuesday, he specifically called for a pardon for Utah resident 
Cory Stringfellow, who was sentenced to more than 15 years in a 
federal penitentiary for drug crimes he committed in his teens and 
early 20s. Anderson said that Stringfellow has more than paid his 
debt to society by serving 5 years in prison, completing a drug 
program and earning a master's degree.

The Stringfellows, however, do not want anyone to think they are soft 
on crime. "We believe that Cory deserved to be punished and Cory 
believed that he should be punished," Stringfellow said. "Our issue 
is . . . the amount of punishment."
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