FOIA

FOIA Contact:

Samuel T. Morison, Attorney Advisor
Office of the Pardon Attorney
4th Floor, 500 First Street, N.W.
Department of Justice
Washington, DC 20530-0001
(202) 616-6070

Conventional Reading Room:

United States Department of Justice
Office of the Pardon Attorney
4th Floor, 500 First Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20530

Electronic Reading Room:

This includes frequently requested records, opinions, policy statements, and staff manuals/instructions to staff, created by the Office of the Pardon Attorney after November 1, 1996.

Component Description:

The Office of the Pardon Attorney receives and reviews petitions for all forms of executive clemency, including pardon, commutation (reduction) of sentence, remission of fine or restitution, and reprieve. It also initiates the necessary investigations of clemency requests, and prepares the report and recommendation of the Attorney General, or his designee, to the President on clemency requests. This office maintains a clemency case file for each individual who has applied for or been granted clemency. The office also acts as liaison with the public for correspondence and informational inquiries about the clemency process or particular clemency issues, and maintains correspondence files relating to such inquiries. The office is also the repository of historical records pertaining to the granting of clemency, and maintains copies of the warrants and proclamations of clemency granted by the President. It also maintains records relating to the administration of the office.

DOJ Reference Guide:

A comprehensive guide to the FOIA that serves as a handbook for obtaining information from the Department.

Special information required to make a FOIA request:

For clemency files, the full name of the person who applied for or was granted clemency. For miscellaneous correspondence files, the full name of the author of the letter and full name of the person on whose behalf the letter was written (if different). For FOIA files, the full name of the person who made the FOIA request.

Publicly available information for which a FOIA request is not required:

Publicly available information: Executive clemency statistics from the administration of President McKinley to the present; rules governing the pardon attorney and petitions for executive clemency published at 28 C.F.R. §§ 0.35-36 and § 1.1 et seq.; forms for applying for executive clemency; publication: Civil Disabilities of Convicted Felons: A State-by-State Survey (October 1996); copies of clemency warrants and proclamations for persons who have been granted executive clemency; description of clemency procedures contained in United States Attorney's Manual at § 1-2.110 et seq.; whether an individual has applied for executive clemency and action on such application.

Major Information Systems