Biden Clemency Recipients Included Virginians Sentenced for “Acquitted Conduct”
Of 2,500 nonviolent drug convictions commuted just before the end of his term by Pres. Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D) on January 17, 2025, two went to Virginia prisoners Terence Richardson and Ferrone Claiborne, who spent decades behind bars for a murder of which they were acquitted. But that fact was mangled by Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) in his rush to denounce the release of the two state prisoners.
Youngkin said that the pair “admitted to being responsible for the brutal killing of Officer Allen Gibson,” which was flatly false. Richardson and Claiborne confessed to involuntary manslaughter and acting as an accessory to that crime, respectively, in Gibson’s 1998 slaying. They did so to avoid the death sentence that they may have faced had they stood trial as two Black men accused of murdering a white cop in the small town of Waverly. Yet when their case went to trial anyway, a jury acquitted them of the killing.
That didn’t stop Youngkin nor did it deter state Attorney General Jason Miyares (R) from a ham-handed stab at turning the clemencies into a partisan talking point: “If the Democrats intend to build their vision of social justice on a pile of dead law enforcement officers, they could send no stronger message than the one they sent today,” Miyares said.
Who really killed Gibson remains a mystery. After Richardson and Claiborne made their desperate “confessions” to the lesser related state crimes, they were hit with federal charges of selling crack cocaine. A jury then acquitted the “Waverly Two” of Gibson’s murder but convicted them on the drug charge. They were sentenced in 2001 to life in prison under an “acquitted conduct” scheme that gave weight to charges of which they were never convicted.
The United States Sentencing Commission severely restricted the practice in 2024. But by then, the convictions had been flagged in a 2021 review by Miyares’ predecessor, former Attorney General Mark Herring (D), who found that a key witness lied to investigators, and that fact was never shared with Richardson or Claiborne before they made their confessions. Based on this, Herring asked for a writ of innocence. However, he left office before it could be granted. Miyares moved in and began fighting the writ, which the State Supreme Court denied on February 27, 2024, directing the Court of Appeals to instruct the trial court to investigate the timing. See: Richardson v. Commonwealth, 80 Va. App. 359, (2024).
Meanwhile, Richardson and Claiborne are expected to be released by the state Department of Corrections in July 2025.
Additional source: The Appeal
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