Commutation

Potential Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee gave an impassioned defense Wednesday of his decision to commute the sentence of an Arkansas man who, years later, murdered four police officers in a Seattle-area coffee shop. The 2009 shooting has been described as a potentially disqualifying vulnerability for Huckabee, who told a group of reporters that he is “seriously contemplating” another presidential run. In 2008, the former Arkansas governor finished second to eventual nominee John McCain in the competition for national convention delegates.

The Metrolink commuter rail service plans to increase fares as early as July to help reduce a $13-million budget deficit largely caused by rising fuel and labor costs, railroad officials said Thursday. If approved, the proposed increase of 5% to 9% will cover only part of the shortfall, making it necessary for Metrolink to seek additional subsidies from the five county transportation agencies that help fund the railroad. "The current economic climate, including soaring fuel prices, requires tough decisions by transportation leaders to fund operations at a level that will continue to meet the region's transportation needs," said John Fenton, Metrolink's chief executive officer.

The parents of Luis Santos, a 22-year-old college student killed in a confrontation with the son of former Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez, filed suit against former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in Sacramento on Thursday, claiming that his decision to reduce the younger Nuñez's sentence violated California's Victims' Bill of Rights. During his last hours in office, Schwarzenegger cut Esteban Nuñez's 16-year sentence for voluntary manslaughter to seven years, without notifying the Santos family.

Those long commutes so typical of Southern California may be doing more than boring you and raising your fatigue level: They also raise your blood pressure and make you fatter, researchers reported Tuesday. For higher blood pressure, the effects kick in at about 10 miles, while for obesity they show up at about 15. Those who traveled the farthest to work every day were also those who were least likely to get adequate exercise. They probably also were more likely to eat fast food and to snack in the car, and were more highly stressed.

Philippine President Joseph Estrada, undergoing an impeachment trial, announced that he will order the commutation of all death sentences to life imprisonment. More than 1,500 people have been sentenced to death in the Philippines since capital punishment was restored in 1994, though no executions were carried out until last year.

Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. commuted the sentences of three inmates Friday, including that of a woman who was serving life in prison for a murder she committed when she was 15. Mary Washington Brown, 46, was convicted of stabbing Charlotte Ida Lessem in 1974 as Brown and a co-defendant robbed her at a Baltimore bus station. The Republican governor's office said Brown had been an exemplary inmate who had earned her high school equivalency and an associate's degree in prison.

India's Supreme Court commuted the death sentences of and freed 19 defendants in the 1991 assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi but ordered that four others in the case face capital punishment. The court also commuted the sentences of three others convicted in the suicide bombing to life imprisonment, nearly one year after a lower court sentenced all 26 to death. Of the 19 freed, two people were acquitted of all charges.

Gov. Mike Huckabee commuted the 21-day state prison sentence for Whitewater figure David Hale on a state insurance conviction. Huckabee, who was unavailable to comment, has said Hale's medical condition affected his decision. Hale, 60, has had two heart attacks and uses a pacemaker. Hale, a former Arkansas judge, pleaded guilty in 1994 to conspiracy and mail fraud counts in the Whitewater inquiry and served 21 months in federal prison. He became independent counsel Kenneth W.

Gov. Mike Easley commuted the death sentence of an inmate who had argued that Easley should not hear clemency pleas because he had advocated capital punishment when he was a prosecutor. Robert Bacon Jr.'s sentence was reduced to life in prison. He had been scheduled to die by injection Friday for the 1987 stabbing death of his lover's husband. "I am satisfied that the prosecutors and judges acted fairly and professionally in this case," Easley said in a statement in Raleigh.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry commuted the death sentence of a mentally retarded Houston man to life in prison in a rare legal victory for a death row inmate in the nation's leading death penalty state. Robert Smith, 35, had been awaiting execution since his conviction for the 1990 murder of James Wilcox during a robbery. It is the first death sentence put aside in Texas since the U.S. Supreme Court banned executions for the mentally retarded in 2002.

Metrolink Chief Executive John Fenton, who worked to improve the service and safety of the struggling commuter line following the deadly Chatsworth crash, announced his resignation Monday to head a Florida-based railroad company. Fenton's departure after not quite 25 months on the job leaves Metrolink with a leadership vacuum at a time when the operation is trying to bolster ridership, reduce costs and install cutting-edge safety measures, such as positive train control, a sophisticated collision-avoidance system.

Retail giantTarget Corp., which is already working on stores in Westwood and downtown Los Angeles, announced plans for another smaller-format urban shop at the Beverly Connection shopping center on West 3rd Street near the Beverly Center. California will have four of these urban stores, dubbed CityTargets, with three in Los Angeles and one in San Francisco. The Westwood store, at the Westwood Market Place near UCLA, will open first, in July, followed in October by the downtown Los Angeles store in the Fig at 7th mall.

California is set for a major debate on the death penalty following qualification Monday of a November ballot measure that would replace capital punishment with a life term without possibility of parole. If passed, the measure would make California the 18th state in the nation without a death penalty. During the last five years, four states have replaced the death penalty and Connecticut is soon to follow. Growing numbers of conservatives in California have joined the effort to repeal the state's capital punishment law, expressing frustration with its price tag and the rarity of executions.

Gov. Jerry Brown on Friday commuted the potential life sentence of a woman convicted of killing her infant grandson 15 years ago, saying "it is clear significant doubts surround" her guilt. Shirley Ree Smith, 51, who was freed in 2006 after nearly a decade in prison but was destined to be reincarcerated after a U.S. Supreme Court decision last year, said it "hasn't sunk in yet" that the threat of more prison time has been lifted. "I just can't believe this is finally over with," said Smith, choked with tears of relief, when reached at her daughter's home in Alexandria, Minn.

Sears Holdings Corp. is slashing costs after losing $2.4 billion in the fourth quarter, including the closure of 120 of its department stores. But one expense remains sky-high: the cost of charter flights for Chief Executive Louis J. D'Ambrosio, who lives in Philadelphia and commutes to Sears' headquarters in Hoffman Estates, Ill. Sears spent $793,224 last year shuttling D'Ambrosio by private jet back and forth, according to its latest proxy...

As the Metro bus lumbered through South Los Angeles carrying passengers headed to work or school, Jesus Navarro could barely keep his eyes open after finishing a graveyard shift in Westwood. The slender 30-year-old security guard with a long, black metal flashlight poking out of his backpack wasn't worried about nodding off. Line 305, which zigzags diagonally for about 20 miles across Los Angeles, carries him home, and he doesn't have to change a seat. "It's a blessing that you have one bus … that can take you from point A to point B," Navarro said.

Gov. Jerry Brown is giving strong consideration to a clemency petition for a grandmother whose conviction for shaking her infant grandson to death was overturned by an appeals court and reinstated by the U.S. Supreme Court, lawyers close to the case said. The governor, who received the petition Wednesday, is being asked to commute the life sentence of Shirley Ree Smith, a 51-year-old grandmother who was sentenced to 15 years to life in 1997 for causing the death of a child. Although Brown is notoriously unpredictable, a longtime advisor said he would be "very surprised" if Brown did not grant clemency to Smith, who has spent 10 years in prison for a death she has maintained was a tragic case of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, not a crime against a beloved child.