Letter to the President's Counsel

JUSTICE FOR JONATHAN POLLARD
788 MARLEE AVENUE, SUITE 212
TORONTO, ONTARIO, CANADA M6B 3K1

PHONE: (416) 781- 3571
FAX: (416) 781 - 3166

BY FAX AND BY MAIL

October 16, 1994

Abner J. Mikva
Counsel to the President
Washington, D.C.

Dear Mr. Mikva:

It is with great anguish that I write to you about the following remarks which have been attributed to you in the press:

How do we start thinking about the criminal justice system, not in terms of whether Jonathan Pollard's sentence should be commuted, but in terms of the consequences of an overcrowded prison system...

The issue of equal justice for all under the law is at the heart of the worldwide appeals to commute Jonathan Pollard's sentence. He is serving the longest, harshest sentence in the history of the United States for one count of passing classified information to an ally. The Pollard case was termed "a fundamental miscarriage of justice" by Appeals Court Judge Steven Williams.

Millions of people worldwide - dignitaries, celebrities, Nobel laureates, major organizations, chief rabbis, eminent clergy, law societies, legislators, city councils, even heads of state - have voiced their concerns to president Clinton, and called upon him to commute Jonathan Pollard's life sentence to time served.

Can it be possible that you have not been fully briefed on the facts of the case? Can it be possible that you have not been briefed on the scope of the public outcry? Or is it the deafening silence of American Jewish leadership that has led you to conclude that the Pollard Case warrants no serious concern.

I beg you from the bottom of an anguished wife's heart to look carefully into the case again, and to consider the true issue - equal justice for all under the law.

Mr. Mikva, you are in the unique position of being able to save my husband's life and in so doing, to restore the principle of equal justice for all to the American system of justice.

I urge you, Mr. Mikva, to act at once.

(signed) Esther Pollard
(Mrs. Jonathan Pollard)