Donald Trump pardons ranchers who sparked a 41-day, armed stand-off
New York — On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump pardoned Oregon cattle ranchers Dwight Hammond and his son after both were convicted on arson charges, which the 2016 occupation of a wildlife refuge, according to a White House statement. The Hammonds’ case led to the armed, 41-day occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, during which one occupier was shot dead by police. The take-over was the latest flare-up in a decades-old conflict over federal control of millions of acres of public land in the Western US. Dwight Hammond, 76, and his son, Steven, 49, were convicted in 2012 for setting a fire that spread onto public grazing land. The two were initially sentenced to less than the legal minimum five-year prison sentence for their crimes, but a federal judge in 2016 ordered the pair to return to serve the full five years, after the father had spent three months in prison and the son one year, according to 2012 court documents. The order to return to prison inspired the refu...
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