A former cocaine dealer who was held out as a positive example of soft-on-crime policies under former President Barack Obama is back in legal trouble after he was charged with three counts of attempted murder this week.
The man, 54-year-old Alton Mills, was a beneficiary of mass sentence commutations by Obama during the final full year of his Presidency.
Obama commuted numerous criminals sentences who were believed to be ‘low-level’ ‘non-violent’ offenders who his administration said was victimized by the War on Drugs.
Mills was given a life sentence after his third conviction on possession of cocaine.
Mills was held out as a success story of Obama’s mass pardon program, and Senator Dick Durbin (D-Il.) even discussed his story on the Senate floor as he advocated for a prison reform bill.
Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Ma.) also claimed that Mills was the victim of a justice system biased against poor people.
“It’s not justice when someone who needs help can go away for life for selling crack on the street, but a bank executive who launders hundreds of millions of dollars for drug cartels can pay a fine and sleep in his own bed at night. There is one set of laws on the books, but two legal systems,” Warren said.
The New York Post Reports–
7 years after Obama commuted Alton Mills' life sentence, the 54-year-old is now accused of shooting a woman on an expressway in Chicago this week. The victim is brain dead and not expected to survive. Sen Dick Durbin said Mills was “an overlooked casualty in our ‘war on drugs.'” pic.twitter.com/CYexzDgV3K
— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) May 19, 2023
A former crack cocaine dealer — whose sentence was commuted by former President Barack Obama — is back behind bars for allegedly shooting a car passenger on an Illinois highway, police said.
Alton Mills, 54, who was granted clemency eight years ago, was booked on three attempted murder charges over the shooting that left the victim critically injured, the Illinois State Police announced.
Mills, while inside a car, is accused of firing “multiple shots” at another vehicle on an Interstate 57 ramp Sunday in Posen, a village roughly 30 miles south of Chicago.
“The back-seat passenger in the victim vehicle was struck by gun fire and was transported to an area hospital with life-threatening injuries,” police said.