Earlier this week, a man convicted in the killing of an 8-year-old boy and his mother in Bridgeport in 1999 has been granted clemency by now former president Joe Biden.

Senator Richard Blumenthal was our state attorney general at the time. He was one of many lawmakers shocked by this pardon.

He spoke with NBC Connecticut’s Mike Hydeck about his take on the pardon.

Mike Hydeck: Senator, welcome back. Earlier this week, you talked about how you were attorney general back in 1999 when this case was tried. You said this case actually changed Connecticut laws. How?

Richard Blumenthal: This case changed Connecticut laws because the victims here, an 8-year-old boy and his mom, Karen Clarke, were potential witnesses in a very serious crime. They were murdered so that they could not testify in court, and as a result, Connecticut adopted a witness protection program named after BJ Brown and his mom, Karen Clarke. And I was shocked and appalled that clemency was accorded to the culprit in this case, who was convicted in state court of conspiracy to murder and then in federal court of federal drug crimes, and that’s why I am pushing again for reforms to the pardon system, which led to clemency to Adrian Peeler, the convicted murderer here.

Mike Hydeck: How do we go about changing the pardon power of the president so this doesn’t happen again? It’s clear that he had served time for the state charge and he was still in prison on the federal drug charge, but it seems like, is there a pardon board that overlooks these or does President Biden just get handed one and then he signs it? It seems as if somebody read past the headline, we would have figured this out.

Richard Blumenthal: That’s really the question of the moment, and a very important question. You know, the pardon power in our federal government is accorded absolutely without any checks and balances, to the president of the United States. It is a relic, in a sense, of the pardon power exercised by the monarchy in England, and the founders gave it to the president without any requirements for transparency or accountability. In the state of Connecticut, we have a Board of Pardons and Paroles, 10 people working full time with set criteria relating to the impact on the victim and the opinion of the prosecutors and the severity of the offense. There’s no such board at the federal level, and so it is completely within the discretion of the president whether to accord clemency, commutation of sentences, reprieve for fines. And that’s why I am proposing that we actually impose some guardrails on the president of the United States, requiring an explanation, at the very least, some explanation for why pardon has been accorded, and some notice to the prosecutors. For example, in the Peeler case, the Department of Justice had an opportunity for the victims, the Clarke family, to come forward and present their opinion, their views, on whether there ought to be clemency. So providing some guardrails at the federal level, as we do in Connecticut and other states do at the state level is really critical, and in the long run, I’m proposing a constitutional amendment that would curb or cut this absolute power of the president. It has to be a constitutional amendment because the pardon power is part of our federal Constitution. But I think the time has come for this absolute power on the part of the president of the United States to be eliminated.

Mike Hydeck: Senator, is there any way to revisit the Peeler case now that Biden is out of office? Or is that pretty much a done deal because of the power of the pardon?

Richard Blumenthal: We probably should look into why there was this pardon for Adrian Peeler. But we also should keep in mind that President Trump granted pardons to some 1,500 convicted or accused rioters who assaulted police officers, many of them injuring severely those police officers, and in some cases actually killing, causing their deaths. So the pardon power used to grant clemency to those rioters who cause those kinds of injuries and death is also part of the picture here, and we should move forward to restrict and cut and curb the presidential powers. And at the same time, perhaps look at why the pardon for Peeler was granted. But the answer to your question is, there’s probably nothing to do right now, actually, to reverse that decision, because it has already been made and there’s no review, which again, points the need for reform here.

Mike Hydeck: Senator Blumenthal, we have to leave it there. We’re looking forward to when that legislation is drafted. We’d like to have you back on when it is.

Connecticut is set to pay nearly $5.9 million to the family of a disabled man who was wrongly imprisoned for more than two decades before he was freed in 2015 when his 1992 conviction in the murder and rape of an 88-year-old grandmother was overturned.

Richard Lapointe, who died at age 74 in 2020, had Dandy-Walker syndrome, a rare congenital brain malformation that his lawyers say was a factor in his false confession. Lapointe was never declared innocent, but his lawyers and the state attorney general’s office eventually agreed to settle after years of legal battles.

The state claims commissioner’s office on Jan. 2 set the money to be awarded to the family, although it still needs to be approved by the legislature. The claims commissioner’s office determines whether people can file lawsuits against the state or receive money under the state’s wrongful incarceration law.

Claims Commissioner Robert Shea Jr. said his office agreed that the award is “reasonable and appropriate.”

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Lapointe’s attorney, Paul Casteleiro, said the award is “a recognition by the state of the wrong it committed in prosecuting and imprisoning an innocent man. Sadly, Richard did not live long enough to witness his final vindication.”

“The award is by no means adequate compensation for what was done to Richard Lapointe,” Casteleiro said Friday, adding that the state destroyed his client’s life “for a crime he did not commit.”

The attorney general’s office said in a statement Friday that it “negotiated a resolution of this claim in the interests of all parties. This reflects that process.”

In 1987, Lapointe’s wife’s grandmother, Bernice Martin, was found stabbed, raped and strangled in her burning apartment in Manchester, Connecticut.

Lapointe was convicted in Martin’s murder in 1992 and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release. Key evidence in the case included Lapointe’s confessions during a nearly 10-hour interrogation by Manchester police.

His lawyers argued his mental disability attributed to him giving false confessions and that the confession was coerced without his lawyers present.

Lapointe was convicted of murder in 1992 and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release. (iStock)

The state Supreme Court ruled 4-2 in a 2015 decision that Lapointe was deprived of a fair trial since prosecutors did not disclose notes by a police officer that may have supported an alibi defense. Later that year, prosecutors said new DNA testing did not implicate Lapointe and all the charges were dropped.

Nobody else has been charged in Martin’s killing.

Lapointe was released from custody a short time later and exited the Hartford courthouse wearing a black T-shirt that read “I didn’t do it” as he threw his hands into the air in triumph.

“Of course I didn’t do it,” Lapointe said at the time. “That wasn’t me. I wouldn’t do nothing like that to nobody. I wouldn’t even kill my worst enemy.”

Casteleiro said the case against Lapointe destroyed his family, who shunned him.

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The state Supreme Court ruled 4-2 in a 2015 decision that Lapointe was deprived of a fair trial. (iStock)

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Before Martin’s death, Lapointe and his wife, who has cerebral palsy, “were making a life together. They were doing okay,” Casteleiro said. But after his arrest, his wife divorced him, and he lost all contact with his son, who was young at the time.

After his release from prison, Lapointe began suffering from dementia, was placed in a nursing home in East Hartford and died after a battle with COVID-19, according to his lawyers.

Lapointe has been supported by several advocates, including the groups Friends of Richard Lapointe and Centurion, an organization Casteleiro works for that helps the wrongly convicted.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Five months and two weeks. That’s how long it took to reopen a beloved quilt shop in Seymour.

“Relieved. Yeah, I think maybe relieved,” said owner Cheryl Ogrisek.

Ogrisek and her husband Brian lost their shop after a historic flood over the summer, which took over homes and businesses in southwestern Connecticut. Communities in Oxford, Southbury, and Seymour are still recovering.

Security footage captures the moment floodwaters tore through their store, wiping out their business of over two decades.

“The next day we talked about what do we do, do we reopen? Do we close? And Brian literally said flip a coin and decide in the air.”

“I said if you flip a coin, you’ll know what wanted to come up,” said Brian Ogrisek.

They made a huge come back and they didn’t just leave it up to chance. They had their whole community by their side, eager to help them get back on their feet.

“If it weren’t for all the folks behind the scenes with like donating towards the GoFundMe’s that we didn’t even start. The GoFundMe’s were started by customers,” said Brian.

One woman says her husband helped out with the cleanup and built cabinets.

“Cause I work, and he’s retired. And it didn’t take really anything for him to come down and help. That was just something he was going to do, and he knew how upset everyone was in the community,” said Robin Litke, of Oxford.

On Saturday, shoppers burst through the doors, ecstatic to see the lights back on.

“Being here all fresh and clean and new is wonderful,” said Cathie Couture, of East Haddam.

The storm wiped out one of the walls. Everything – the floor, shelves, and fabrics – was covered in mud. So much had to be replaced, but one thing that survived was a quilt.

“Every single block that we were given is in there, I made a sure of it,” said Cheryl.

Ogrisek made this quilt with her neighbors during the pandemic.

Now, it hangs high on the wall, serving as a reminder of what can happen when a community, much like the patches of a quilt, come together.

“It’s our community, it’s just the world we live in,” said Cheryl.