Who is Carlos Vignali?
January 20th 2001 was President Clinton's last day in office. It was also Carlos Vignali's last day in jail.
Vignali was freed by Clinton after serving less than six years of a 14-and-a-half year sentence for cocaine trafficking. The president's move stunned detectives on the case.
At Vignali's 1994 trial, prosecutors played a rap video in an effort to tie him to the gangster culture. He was an aspiring rapper, known as C-Low, with the group Brownside. But the recordings that sent Vignali to jail were federal wiretaps, in which police say he talked about shipping cocaine and money between Los Angeles and Minneapolis.
Prosecutors say Vignali was a key player in a 30-member drug ring.
So why did President Clinton choose to cut short Vignali's prison term, over the objections of prosecutors?
Prosecutors opposed the Vignali commutation, even though it was processed through normal channels at the Justice Department.
The answer seems to lie in a six-year campaign by Vignali's father, Horacio, an affluent Los Angeles real estate developer, to win his son's freedom.
After his son was arrested, the elder Vignali, who is active in Latino causes, stepped up his donations to L.A. area politicians, giving more than $160,000. Vignali's father persuaded at least nine prominent political figures to contact the White House on his son's behalf.
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then I watched some of the 1st video.
