Two different headlines. (Second one pictured) How to make Race Baiting the New Normal for 2020, and hurt POTUS.
Cohen, Manafort were released from prison early because of COVID-19. That's not the norm.
Michael Cohen is just the latest well-connected federal prisoner to be sent home early because of the coronavirus, even though he has served only a third of his sentence — well shy of the 50 percent threshold federal officials often cite in denying requests for early release. By contrast, prisoners like Eddie Brown, an Oklahoma man who has served a bigger portion of his sentence than Cohen and also cites health problems, remain behind bars, raising questions about the Bureau of Prisons' opaque process and its fairness.
New data show that Cohen, along with former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, released last week, are among the relatively few federal prisoners to win early release in the seven weeks since Attorney General William Barr cited the pandemic in ordering more federal prisoners to be let out. During that time, the number of people in home confinement increased by only 2,578, about 1.5 percent of the nearly 171,000 people in federal prisons and halfway houses when Barr issued his memo.
Cohen, President Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer, was sentenced to three years in prison, and Manafort to seven and a half years. Manafort has served less than a third of his sentence, so he, too, did not meet the federal criteria for early release, although he and Cohen do have health conditions that put them at added risk if they contract the virus.
Brown, who is in prison in Tennessee for selling meth, has also cited his health in seeking emergency release, said his daughter, Amanda Bolding. Brown has served six years of his 15-year sentence, prison records show. But like thousands of other prisoners, he can’t afford the kind of help Cohen and Manafort had that has proven crucial for many of the releases so far: a lawyer.
Groups and relatives advocating for the release of prisoners at risk from the virus say they don’t begrudge well-connected people achieving that goal. The problem, they said, is that many other people who could meet Barr’s criteria languish in prison, without legal help, unable to understand the complex process or lacking connections to help them as the pandemic spreads. As of Wednesday, the official tally had 59 federal prisoners dying from COVID-19 and more than 4,600 testing positive, though health experts believe that’s almost certainly an undercount.
Melissa Ketter, a Minnesota woman whose daughter has served just over half of her sentence for a federal nonviolent drug crime, said she almost cried when she heard about Cohen’s release.
"I'm happy for him don’t get me wrong — but at the same time it was like, the rich white guy gets out early. I don’t wish for bad things to happen to these people, but it’s like can everybody be treated the same?" Ketter said.
The release process has been marked by foot-dragging and confusion, critics say, and a federal judge in a ruling Tuesday labeled the results “paltry.”
The Bureau of Prisons won’t release data, won’t answer questions and keeps shifting policy on who qualifies for release, according to Georgetown Law professor Shon Hopwood, an expert on criminal justice reform.
“The Bureau of Prisons is operating all behind closed doors, and that’s a big part of the problem,” Hopwood said.
Lawyers for Cohen and Manafort did not return messages seeking comment.
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https://www.yahoo.com/news/early-release-trump-associates-shows-234506604.html