15.5-year drug sentence was commuted by President Clinton

Grants | Legacy Digitization |
January 24, 2001
Annie Feidt - Reporter
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A Minnesota man is enjoying his first free days in eleven years thanks to a last-minute commutation from President Clinton. Kim Allen Willis was convicted of conspiring to distribute cocaine in 1990 for a small role he played in the notorious Plukey Duke drug ring. Under mandatory minimum drug sentencing laws, U.S. district judge David Doty was forced to sentence Willis to 15 and 1/2 years in prison. In a letter to President Clinton petitioning for Willis' release, Doty wrote "before I pronounced Mr. Willis' sentence, I told him that he did not deserve the sentence I was going to impose on him, but I had no other choice except to do what the law required." Willis says he got the news of his commutation when he called a friend on Saturday morning:

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