SACRAMENTO, Calif. _ California Gov. Jerry Brown announced Friday that he had issued pardons to 36 people, including three immigrants with criminal records who face possible deportation.
Brown also issued 31 commutations reducing inmates' sentences.
The governor has stepped up a focus on immigrants at risk of deportation in recent rounds of pardons since President Donald Trump took office, while the federal government has increased arrests and detentions of immigrants who are in the country illegally. A pardon can be key for someone hoping to avoid deportation.
Among those Brown pardoned is Phal Sok, who was featured in a Los Angeles Times story in March 2017. Sok, a Cambodian, was brought to the U.S. when he was a year old. At 17, he was convicted of three felony counts of armed robbery after he and his friends held up a mom-and-pop sewing shop. He served 15 years of a 23-year prison sentence before he was released under an initiative meant to aid juvenile offenders.
Brown has exercised his pardon power substantially more than preceding governors. Since taking office in 2011, he has granted 1,186 pardons and 82 commutations.
