Hours before vacating his office, Gov. Ernie Fletcher pardoned or commuted the sentences...

Hours before vacating his office, Gov. Ernie Fletcher pardoned or commuted the sentences of 101 people, including several convicted of murder. He had examined more than a thousand requestes. Among those given relief by the outgoing governor is a man on Death Row, Jeffrey Devan Leonard, who was convicted of stabbing a store clerk in 1983. Fletcher reduced his sentence to life without parole. Leonard had been convicted under the name of James Earl Slaughter. The Governor noted in his commutation that Leonard was not provided with adequate representation and that Leonard’s attorney did not even know his client's real name during the trial. The governor’s general counsel, David Fleenor, stated, “We're not going to execute somebody who clearly was denied a basic right."
There have been 3 commutations of death sentences in 2007 in the Usa. There were none in 2006.