Jesse Webster
Jesse Webster is a prison inmate who was sentenced life without parole for charges of drug trafficking and tax fraud. He received significant media attention at the end of 2013 after the ACLU published a report discussing life sentences for nonviolent offenses. History. Jesse Webster began a job at a local carwash as a teenager, first after school and on weekends, and then full-time. In 1985, one of Jesse's customers, a drug dealer, offered him a job as a driver. Jesse accepted the job, and dropped out of school in 9th grade to become more involved  in the drug trade. He met Archie West in 1985, and subsequently his associates Andre Mitchell, Sam Mitchell, Dino, Reginald Jones and Sherman Randolph. In 1992, West agreed to drive for Webster through 1995, and between 1992 and 1995, Jesse and his associates distributed 200 to 300 kilograms of cocaine. In August 1994, Webster helped arrange to purchase 25 kilograms of cocaine from a drug informant. Webster entered a motion for a new trial on July 30, 1997, which was declined, and he appealed in 1998, but his sentence was affirmed. Webster filed a petition in 2013 to commute his  sentence, with letters of recommendation from his judge, James Zagel, and both his prosecutors. Webster worked with his lawyer, Jessica Ring Amunson to get his sentence commuted by President Barack Obama. This goal was achieved on March 30, 2016, when Obama commuted Webster's sentence to expire on September 26 of that year. Prison Life. Webster began counseling fellow inmates while in prison, and became a Captain's orderly. He transferred from a high security prison in 2011, to a medium security institution in Greenville, Illinois. In Greenville he earned his GED, and began tutoring other inmates. Webster has one  daughter who is enrolled in a criminal justice program at Kennedy King College, and one grandchild.