Alice Marie Johnson (born May 30, 1955) is an American criminal justice reform advocate and former federal prisoner. She was convicted in 1996 for her involvement in a Memphis cocaine trafficking organization and sentenced to

life imprisonment Life imprisonment is any sentence (law), sentence of imprisonment under which the convicted individual is to remain incarcerated for the rest of their natural life (or until pardoned or commuted to a fixed term). Crimes that result in life impr ...

. In June 2018, after serving 21 years in prison, she was released from the

Federal Correctional Institution, Aliceville The Federal Correctional Institution, Aliceville (FCI Aliceville) is a low-security United States federal prison for female inmates in Alabama. It is operated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, a division of the United States Department of Justice ...

, after President Donald Trump granted her

clemency A pardon is a government decision to allow a person to be relieved of some or all of the legal consequences resulting from a criminal conviction. A pardon may be granted before or after conviction for the crime, depending on the laws of the j ...

, thereby

commuting Commuting is periodically recurring travel between a place of residence and place of work or study, where the traveler, referred to as a commuter, leaves the boundary of their home community. By extension, it can sometimes be any regular o ...

her sentence, effective immediately. On February 20, 2025, Trump named her as his administration's "pardon czar".

Early life, crime, and sentence

Johnson was born in

Mississippi Mississippi ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Alabama to the east, the Gulf of Mexico to the south, Louisiana to the s ...

, and her memoirs recount growing up as one of nine children of

sharecropper Sharecropping is a legal arrangement in which a landowner allows a tenant (sharecropper) to use the land in return for a share of the crops produced on that land. Sharecropping is not to be conflated with tenant farming, providing the tenant a ...

s, becoming pregnant as a sophomore in high school, and later working as a secretary. At the time of her arrest, she was a single mother of five children. Johnson told ''Mic'' in 2017 that she became involved in the drug trade after she lost her job at

FedEx FedEx Corporation, originally known as Federal Express Corporation, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate holding company specializing in Package delivery, transportation, e-commerce, and ...

, where she had worked for ten years, due to a

gambling addiction Problem gambling, ludopathy, or ludomania is repetitive gambling behavior despite harm and negative consequences. Problem gambling may be diagnosed as a mental disorder according to DSM-5 if certain diagnostic criteria are met. Pathological ga ...

; this was followed by a divorce and the loss of her youngest son in a motorcycle accident. She filed for bankruptcy in 1991, and

foreclosure Foreclosure is a legal process in which a lender attempts to recover the balance of a loan from a borrower who has Default (finance), stopped making payments to the lender by forcing the sale of the asset used as the Collateral (finance), coll ...

of her house followed. Johnson was arrested in 1993 and convicted in 1996 of eight federal criminal counts relating to her involvement in a

Memphis, Tennessee Memphis is a city in Shelby County, Tennessee, United States, and its county seat. Situated along the Mississippi River, it had a population of 633,104 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List of municipalities in Tenne ...

-based cocaine trafficking organization. In addition to drug

conspiracy A conspiracy, also known as a plot, ploy, or scheme, is a secret plan or agreement between people (called conspirers or conspirators) for an unlawful or harmful purpose, such as murder, treason, or corruption, especially with a political motivat ...

counts, she was convicted of

money laundering Money laundering is the process of illegally concealing the origin of money obtained from illicit activities (often known as dirty money) such as drug trafficking, sex work, terrorism, corruption, and embezzlement, and converting the funds i ...

and

structuring Structuring, also known as smurfing in banking jargon, is the practice of executing financial transactions such as making bank deposits in a specific pattern, calculated to avoid triggering financial institutions to file reports required by law ...

, the latter crime because of her purchase of a house with a down payment structured to avoid hitting a $10,000 reporting threshold. The Memphis operation involved over a dozen individuals. The indictment, which named 16 defendants, described her as a leader in a multi-million dollar cocaine ring, and detailed dozens of drug transactions and deliveries. Evidence presented at trial showed that the Memphis operation was connected to Colombian drug dealers based in Texas. She was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole in 1997. At the sentencing hearing, U.S. District Judge Julia Gibbons said that Johnson was "the quintessential entrepreneur" in an operation that dealt in 2,000 to 3,000 kilograms of cocaine, with a "very significant" impact on the community. Co-defendants Curtis McDonald and Jerlean McNeil were sentenced to life and 19 years in federal prison, respectively. A number of other co-defendants who testified against Johnson received sentences between probation and 10 years. Following her conviction, Johnson acknowledged that she was an intermediary in the drug trafficking organization, but said she did not actually make deals or sell drugs.

Imprisonment

Johnson became a grandmother and great-grandmother while imprisoned. She exhibited good behavior in prison. In a memoir written after her release, she wrote that she served time at the Federal Medical Center, Carswell, the federal prison hospital in Texas, where she became a certified hospice worker, and was subsequently transferred to FCI Aliceville to be closer to family. In letters supporting her bid for clemency, staff members at FCI Aliceville wrote that Johnson did not commit any disciplinary infractions during her incarceration at FCI Aliceville. Johnson participated in a pilot program, introduced in 2016 by Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, that provided videoconferencing access to certain female federal prisoners. The program allowed the online publication ''Mic'' to record a video interview with her that went viral and brought her case to public attention. She also used

Skype Skype () was a proprietary telecommunications application operated by Skype Technologies, a division of Microsoft, best known for IP-based videotelephony, videoconferencing and voice calls. It also had instant messaging, file transfer, ...

while imprisoned to speak at

Hunter College Hunter College is a public university in New York City, United States. It is one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York and offers studies in more than one hundred undergraduate and postgraduate fields across five schools ...

Yale Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and one of the nine colonial colleges ch ...

, and other audiences. During her time in prison, she became an ordained minister, and credited her grant of clemency to divine intervention.

Commutation and pardon

A campaign in support of her release was launched by the

American Civil Liberties Union The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is an American nonprofit civil rights organization founded in 1920. ACLU affiliates are active in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. The budget of the ACLU in 2024 was $383 million. T ...

and the website '' Mic''; activists who supported her release argued that the punishment was excessive and an example of disproportionate impacts on

African Americans African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa ...

. A number of individuals and organizations supported Johnson's bid for clemency, including U.S. Representatives Steve Cohen,

Bennie Thompson Bennie Gordon Thompson (born January 28, 1948) is an American politician and educator serving as the U.S. representative for since 1993. A member of the Democratic Party, Thompson served as the chair of the Committee on Homeland Security fro ...

, and Marc Veasey, law professors Marc Morjé Howard, Mark Osler, and Shon Hopwood, and ''

Orange is the New Black ''Orange Is the New Black'' (sometimes abbreviated to ''OITNB'') is an American comedy-drama television series created by Jenji Kohan for Netflix. The series is based on Piper Kerman's memoir '' Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Pr ...

'' author Piper Kerman. According to her lawyer Shawn Holley, the warden supported her release.Johnson's was one of the 16,776 petitions filed in the

Obama administration Barack Obama's tenure as the 44th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2009, and ended on January 20, 2017. Obama, a Democrat from Illinois, took office following his victory over Republican nomine ...

's 2014

project. In 2016, she wrote an op-ed for CNN asking for forgiveness and a second chance. Her application was denied just before Obama left office. In 2018,

Kim Kardashian Kimberly Noel Kardashian (born October 21, 1980) is an American media personality, socialite, and businesswoman. She first gained media attention as a friend and stylist of Paris Hilton, but received wider notice after the celebrity sex tape ...

and President Donald Trump's son-in-law

Jared Kushner Jared Corey Kushner (born January 10, 1981) is an American businessman and investor. He is a son-in-law of the president of the United States, Donald Trump, through his marriage to Ivanka Trump and served as a senior advisor in his father-in- ...

sought to persuade Trump to grant clemency to Johnson. In late May 2018, Kardashian met with the President in the

Oval Office The Oval Office is the formal working space of the president of the United States. Part of the Executive Office of the President of the United States, it is in the West Wing of the White House, in Washington, D.C. The oval room has three lar ...

to urge him to pardon Johnson. On June 6, 2018, following Kardashian's appeal, Trump commuted Johnson's sentence, and Johnson was released. The commutation was one of a series of acts of clemency made by Trump in a "few high-profile cases brought to him by associates and allies." Kardashian's then-husband

Kanye West Ye ( ; born Kanye Omari West ; June 8, 1977) is an American rapper, singer and record producer. One of the most prominent figures in hip-hop, he is known for his varying musical style and polarizing cultural and political commentary. After ...

was a noted supporter of Trump, something she attributed to be partially responsible for Johnson's release. West referenced Johnson's clemency in the song " Cudi Montage". The ''Washington Post''s '' Wonkblog'' described the pardon as somewhat surprising given Trump's past statements in favor of executing drug dealers. When Trump delivered his State of the Union address on February 5, 2019, Johnson was a guest of the president. Trump asked her to stand up to be recognized, and she received a standing ovation from members of Congress. On August 28, 2020—one day after Johnson spoke at the 2020 Republican National Convention—Trump granted her a full pardon. He also commuted Curtis McDonald's sentence in October.

Memoir and activism

Since her release, Johnson has become an advocate for criminal justice reform in the United States, often invoking her personal experience. The month after her release, in July 2018, she called for an end to

mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing requires that people convicted of certain crimes serve a predefined term of imprisonment, removing the discretion of judges to take issues such as extenuating circumstances and a person's likelihood of rehabilitation into co ...

. In September 2019, she met with Governor Bill Lee of Tennessee to promote greater access to expungement and prisoner education and reduction in barriers to

reentry Atmospheric entry (sometimes listed as Vimpact or Ventry) is the movement of an object from outer space into and through the gases of an atmosphere of a planet, dwarf planet, or natural satellite. Atmospheric entry may be ''uncontrolled entr ...

, and to express concerns about the cash bail system. Johnson also advocates for the inclusion of female voices in the conversation around criminal justice reform. Ahead of

International Women's Day International Women's Day (IWD) is celebrated on 8 March, commemorating women's fight for equality and liberation along with the women's rights movement. International Women's Day gives focus to issues such as gender equality, reproductive righ ...

2019,

UN Women The United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, also known as UN Women, is a United Nations entity charged with working for gender equality and the empowerment of women. UN Women is charged with advocating for the righ ...

featured her as part of its "Courage to Question" series. In May 2019, memoirs written by Johnson with Nancy French, entitled ''After Life: My Journey From Incarceration To Freedom'', were published by

HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is a British–American publishing company that is considered to be one of the "Big Five (publishers), Big Five" English-language publishers, along with Penguin Random House, Hachette Book Group USA, Hachette, Macmi ...

, with a foreword written by

. In 2020, Lyn Ulbricht wrote that Johnson had signed in support of clemency for her son Ross from the outgoing president, Donald Trump.

Pardon Czar

Trump, in his second presidential term, appointed Johnson in February 2025 for a role as "Pardon Czar" where she would recommend other prisoners for clemency. Johnson became the first person to ever hold this position. In this newly-created position, Johnson has been tasked with identifying candidates for a

pardon A pardon is a government decision to allow a person to be relieved of some or all of the legal consequences resulting from a criminal conviction. A pardon may be granted before or after conviction for the crime, depending on the laws of the j ...

who have "been victims of lawfare." In March 2025, Carlos Watson thanked Johnson for her role in securing a pardon hours before reporting to prison. In May 2025, Johnson defended her work related to the pardons of Julie Chrisley and Todd Chrisley, claiming the two were victims of "a weaponized justice system." She was also involved in the commutation of

Larry Hoover Larry Hoover Sr. (born November 30, 1950)"Larry Hoover"
''Biography.com''. Retrieved 18 April 2019.

's sentence.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Johnson, Alice Marie African-American women activists African-American memoirists American women memoirists 21st-century American memoirists 21st-century American women writers 21st-century African-American women writers 21st-century African-American writers Criminal justice reform in the United States Second presidency of Donald Trump First presidency of Donald Trump Commutations granted by Donald Trump People pardoned by Donald Trump Prisoners sentenced to life imprisonment by the United States federal government People convicted of money laundering American people convicted of drug offenses Activists from Memphis, Tennessee Criminals from Memphis, Tennessee 1955 births Living people