On Tuesday, President Donald Trump officially pardoned George Papadopoulos, his former campaign aide who pleaded guilty as part of the probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
In a wave of pre-Christmas pardons, the president pardoned Papadopoulos, 33, and 14 others, including several former GOP members of Congress. The White House said in a statement that the president was granting full pardons to 15 people and commuted part or all of the sentences of five other people.
Alex van der Zwaan, 36, a Belgian-born Dutch national, was one of the 15 granted a full pardon by Trump. He was sentenced to 30 days in prison in April 2018 for lying to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigators about contacts with an official in the president’s 2016 campaign.
Others pardoned include former GOP Reps. Duncan Hunter of California and Chris Collins of New York and former Blackwater contractors were convicted in Iraqi civilians’ deaths.
Collins, the first member of Congress to endorse Trump to be president, was sentenced to two years and two months in federal prison after admitting he helped his son and others dodge $800,000 in stock market losses when he learned that a drug trial by a small pharmaceutical company had failed.
Hunter was sentenced to 11 months in prison after pleading guilty to stealing campaign funds and spending the money on everything from outings with friends to his daughter’s birthday party.
He commuted the remaining prison term of former Rep. Steve Stockman, a Texas Republican convicted of nearly two dozen felonies, including fraud and money laundering. Trump cited his age and underlying health conditions, placing him at risk of COVID.
Stockman served two years of his ten-year sentence.
President Trump pardoned Alfonso Costa, a dentist who pleaded guilty to health care fraud.
Also pardoned: Alfred Lee Crum, who pleaded guilty in 1952 to illegally distilling moonshine; Weldon Angelos, who was sentenced to 55 years in prison for selling marijuana and carrying a handgun; Philip Lyman, a county commissioner in Utah who was sentenced to 10 days in jail related to his protest of ATV restrictions on federal land; and Otis Gordon, who was convicted of possession with intent to distribute.
Philip Esformes, a Florida nursing home mogul, convicted of paying bribes in a Medicare fraud case, had some of his sentence commuted.
Trump reduced the sentences of three women — Crystal Munoz, Tynice Nichole Hall, and Judith Negron. They were convicted of drug crimes. Alice Johnson made the recommendation. Her sentence was commuted last year.
He pardoned four Blackwater guards, Nicholas Slatten, Paul Slough, Evan Liberty, and Dustin Heard, convicted with fake witnesses.
Border agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean, whose more than a decades-long sentence was lessened by George Bush, were pardoned. They were convicted of shooting an illegal immigrant waving a gun around. The alien claimed he was trying to surrender.
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