Ever since I learned about former governor Steve Merrill’s death at such a young age, 74, I have been thinking about the conditional pardon he granted to my client, June Briand, in December 1996.
It changed the life of a young woman who had survived years of domestic violence.
I took June’s case because I’d become an advocate for survivors of domestic violence. I did not know anything about the pardon process, so I had a lot to learn in that regard, like, for instance, who has the authority to grant a pardon.
I learned that the authority to issue pardons and commutations is found in New Hampshire Constitution Pt. 2, Article 52 and NHRSA 4:24. Contrary to some of the reporting over the past week regarding the Michael Addison case, the sole authority to grant a pardon lies with the governor. The Executive Council is merely involved in an advisory capacity.
The next question I had was what did we have to prove in order to win a pardon? I found out that there had been one other pardon granted to another woman who was a survivor of domestic violence. Her name was Kathy Kaplan and in 1988 Gov. John H. Sununu, the father of our current governor, granted her a pardon after she was convicted of hiring someone to kill her abusive husband.
What I learned is that governors are historically stingy when it comes to granting pardons and that there is no magic formula that will win the day. That is still the case today. I also found that it was less a legal process and more a public awareness campaign. Because the Governor and Executive Council are elected officials they are persuaded not only by the facts of the case but also by the opinions of their constituents.
In June’s case, Gov. Merrill and the Executive Council were equally involved in the case. They granted our request for a hearing and held a day-long hearing during which experts testified regarding the Battered Women’s Syndrome and character witnesses testified on behalf of June. If there were still questions following the hearing, time was allowed for either myself or the attorney general to gather more evidence. In other words no stone was left unturned.
In the end, the governor and all five members of the Executive Council supported the conditional pardon. They found that because June had pleaded guilty to second-degree murder she understood that what she did was wrong. She also showed extreme remorse, which was evident by the tears that streamed down her face as she testified about the crime and its effects on the family and her children.
During the 10 years she had already spent in prison she had taken advantage of every program the prison had to offer. She earned an associate’s degree from a local college and had gone on the speaking circuit to high schools to share her story in hopes of raising awareness and stopping future domestic violence incidents. The bottom line is the Governor and Executive Council found that June had been remarkably rehabilitated and there was no longer any need to waste the state’s resources to imprison her any longer.
It was a victory for June and for the broader domestic violence advocacy community. Finally, there was recognition that survivors of domestic violence had deeply personal stories to tell that raised awareness beyond the basic stereotypes that had dominated in those days.
When I learned that Dan Feltes reversed his position regarding a possible commutation of Michael Addison’s death penalty sentence, I was disappointed. How can he say he would deny the commutation without ever seeing a petition? Besides it is quite premature to be discussing this issue. My understanding is his case is still slowly wending its way through the appeals process.
Why are the candidates being asked about an issue that is probably still many years in the future? My guess is because the case raises issues regarding racial justice. How can it not? Addison is a Black man convicted in a state that is 94% white, according to 2010 census. No one has been put to death in New Hampshire since 1939 and he is the only person on death row. According to New Hampshire Police Memorial there have been 43 names etched on the memorial. Many of the 43 were shot in the line of duty. Why aren’t all those killers on death row? I would submit that none of those shooters were Black and that is why.
I suspect if Michael Addison were to seek commutation of his death sentence, there would be sufficient grounds to commute the sentence to a life sentence without parole. I would be honored to join the team advocating for his commutation. It would be an excellent opportunity to dig deep into the history of racism that has impacted the African American community for centuries, from slavery, through Jim Crow, through the fight for civil and voting rights, and the current epidemic of police killings of Black people.
It took decades to fully understand the Battered Women’s Syndrome before June Briand earned her freedom. I’m not suggesting Addison would ever earn his freedom from his maximum security cell where he enjoys little to no privileges, but at least he would be free from the prospect of dying at the hands of the state. I cannot imagine having that hanging over your head day after day. That seems like cruel and unusual punishment to me.
The last time I saw June was in 2002 at a book release event showcasing the book that Robert Davidson wrote about June’s story called Fighting Back: A Battered Woman’s Desperate Struggle to Survive. She had met a new man and had a baby and was enjoying her freedom. I lost contact with her after she obtained permission from the Parole Board to move out of state. A part of her condition in the pardon was that she was to be on lifetime parole.
As the 20th anniversary of the pardon was approaching in December 2016, I decided to try to track June down to see how she was doing. I was shocked to learn that she had died in May 2015. The obituary that I found online was only four lines long and gave no clue as to the cause of death. It turns out her life partner had died in 2014, just about the same time that June found out she had cancer, which would take her life a year later. Her baby was in his late teens and was now an orphan. The only consolation I could take away from learning this news was that she had 18 years of freedom, four of which were as a result of the pardon.
(Susannah Colt lives in Whitefield. She can be reached at susannahbcolt@gmail.com.)