Drug Dealer Released Under Trump Charged in Assault on Teenager

drug dealer released under trump charged in assault on teenager

Former President Donald Trump leaves a commit to caucus campaign event at the Whiskey River bar on December 02, 2023 in Ankeny, Iowa. A criminal justice reform law that Trump signed into law was used to secure early release of an inmate who was indicted for his role in a triple shooting.

A drug dealer who was released under former President Donald Trump’s sweeping criminal justice reform has been charged with first-degree assault of a teenager.

William Dredden was indicted along with his wife, Tiffany Harrison, in connection with their alleged involvement in the assault outside a Baltimore high school, prosecutors said Wednesday.

Authorities say that the couple accompanied their 15-year-old son to the Carver Vocational Technical High School on October 27 and allegedly joined their son in the assault of another teenager, during which their son pistol-whipped the victim. Dredden and Harrison each face 15 charges, including first-degree assault, reckless endangerment and use of a firearm in the commission of a crime of violence.

Records show that Dredden had secured early release from a federal prison 14 months before the October incident, after making a claim under the First Step Act, which was the most significant criminal justice reform legislation passed in nearly a decade. Trump signed it into law in December 2018.

Baltimore police told Newsweek that Dredden had previously been arrested multiple times for drug-related charges. Dredden’s criminal history was first reported by Baltimore TV station WBAL.

The bipartisan legislation, which aimed to cut unnecessarily long federal sentences and improve conditions in federal prisons, was widely supported by organizations favorable to both Democrats and Republicans.

Although Trump ran a “tough on crime” campaign when he was elected to the White House in 2016, he came to support the First Step Act after intense lobbying from his son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner. Kushner was credited with securing both Trump’s and Vice President Mike Pence’s support, reaching out to the Rupert Murdoch family for positive coverage of the legislation on Fox News and arranging for Trump to meet with celebrities like Kim Kardashian, who were lobbying for the bill’s passage.

Newsweek reached out to Trump via email for comment.

Two months after signing the bill into law, Trump touted the criminal justice reform as one of his biggest accomplishments.

“This legislation reformed sentencing laws that have wrongly and disproportionately harmed the African-American community,” Trump said during his 2019 State of the Union address. “The First Step Act gives nonviolent offenders the chance to reenter society as productive, law-abiding citizens. Now, states across the country are following our lead. America is a nation that believes in redemption.”

At a 2019 celebration designating April as “Second Chance Month,” Trump said his administration’s next criminal justice priority would be a “Second Step Act” that would focus on “successful reentry and reduce unemployment for Americans with past criminal records.”

The First Step Act amended a section of the United States Code that allowed for a defendant to file a motion for compassionate release. Previously, only the director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons was allowed to file that motion on the defendant’s behalf. Because of the expansion, many inmates sought early release under the act’s amended compassionate relief provisions.

Sentenced to 48 months and three years of supervised release in July 2020, Dredden applied for compassionate relief within five months of sentencing, citing his obesity, high blood pressure and asthma as COVID-19 risk factors. He was imprisoned after federal law enforcement identified him as a member of an “open-air drug shop operating in southwest Baltimore, Maryland” that sold heroin, fentanyl and cocaine.

The Department of Justice accepted Dredden’s guilty plea to drug conspiracy, putting him in federal custody at a facility in New Jersey for 48 months, from November 20, 2019, until November 20, 2023. But prosecutors stressed that Dredden needed to serve his full sentence because of his “revolving door of short encounters with the justice system” and his history of violating probation.

When Dredden filed his First Step Act claim, the Justice Department pushed back, telling a judge that he continued to pose a danger to the community of Baltimore and urged the court to consider “the issue of future dangerousness.” But Dredden ultimately secured early release on June 15, 2022—17 months before his release date.

The First Step Act was a centerpiece of Trump’s 2020 campaign. His reelection campaign spent millions running an ad focused on the legislation during the 2020 Super Bowl, and the Republican National Convention featured an appearance by Alice Marie Johnson, who was granted clemency by Trump.

Since Joe Biden won the 2020 election, Republicans have increasingly embraced a “tough on crime” platform and railed against progressive reforms, like bail reform and liberal prosecutors who grant early release or hand down softer sentences.

Throughout the 2024 presidential race, Trump’s GOP challengers have increasingly criticized the First Step Act. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, for example, has pledged to repeal the law, which he’s nicknamed a “jailbreak bill.” And former Vice President Mike Pence, who has since dropped out of the GOP nomination contest, said it’s time to “rethink” the bill.

Trump hasn’t publicly defended the First Step Act since announcing his third White House bid. But last month he seemed to make a nod to the legislation while celebrating an endorsement from the co-founder of a local Black Lives Matter chapter in Rhode Island.

“I have done more for Black people than any other President (Lincoln?), including 10 year funding for Historically Black Colleges and Universities, where they had none, Opportunity Zones, Criminal Justice Reform, and much more,” Trump said in a Truth Social post last week.

The Trump-era law remains contentious at a policy level. The Federal Bureau of Prisons has faced criticisms over its interpretation and implementation of the First Step Act. And prisoner advocacy groups continue to take issue with the thousands of nonviolent federal prisoners who remain locked up despite their eligibility for early release under the law.

However, an August 2023 brief from the Sentencing Project, a research and advocacy center focused on decarceration in the U.S., touted the successes of the act, including the release of more than 4,500 inmates under compassionate release. The brief said that among the nearly 30,000 individuals who were released early by the First Step Act, only 13 percent were rearrested or reincarcerated.

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