South Dakota Gov. Larry Rhoden speaks to the media on March 6, 2025, at the Capitol in Pierre. (Makenzie Huber/South Dakota Searchlight)
Gov. Larry Rhoden has issued 65 pardons and one commutation since taking office in January, according to records on file with the South Dakota Secretary of State.
As of Sept. 29, Rhoden had also denied four pardon requests, and denied one request for a commutation.
A state board makes recommendations, but the South Dakota Constitution grants the governor sole authority to extend clemency to people convicted of crimes.
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Pardons scrub all government documentation of a crime from a person’s public record. Commutations reduce sentences for inmates, often making them immediately eligible for parole and early release from prison.
In an interview with South Dakota Searchlight, Rhoden said his legal team reviews the notes, video interviews with applicants and records for each pardon and commutation request carefully before he makes the call. He trusts his legal team, he said, but “for me, it boils down to just my personal feelings and beliefs about the goodness of humanity.”
“It’s just looking for signs that you feel like they deserve a second chance,” Rhoden said.
Kristi Noem, who preceded Rhoden in office and departed in January to become secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, issued a total of 348 pardons and 27 commutations during her six years in office.
State law grants the governor the authority to let the state Board of Pardons and Paroles review and recommend pardons and commutations. The board meets and issues recommendations on a monthly basis, in each case after hearing directly from the person requesting clemency and sometimes also from the person’s victims or the prosecutors involved in the case.
Rhoden’s approach, decisions
Noem would sometimes wait months between signing each batch of clemency orders. Rhoden signed his clemency orders at least once a month during the first half of 2025, but hasn’t issued any since July. His first dozen pardons were signed on March 3.
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Parole board rules say a person must be at least five years removed from the date of their sentencing to request a pardon.
Pardons are filed and held as a public record at the Secretary of State’s Office for five years after being signed and are sealed thereafter. Commutations, also held by the Secretary of State’s Office, are not closed after five years and do not shield any record of a conviction or the circumstances surrounding it from public disclosure.
Noem’s pardons typically went to people with lower-level crimes like drunken driving, drug possession or property crimes. She occasionally forgave more serious crimes, such as third-degree rape or assault, often decades after the incidents.
The same pattern has held true for Rhoden in the 65 pardons issued thus far. Few of the crimes pardoned were felonies against other people. One man was pardoned for two charges of attempted sexual contact with a child under 16, for which he was convicted in 2001 and 2003, respectively. Another was pardoned for a robbery and an attempted robbery, both of which took place 41 years ago.
Commutation granted
Rhoden’s sole commutation thus far went to Jack Sidney Hagen, a 64-year-old initially given three consecutive life sentences for a 1995 break-in and kidnapping in Black Hawk.
At his commutation hearing last year, Hagen told the parole board he’d been foolish and quick to anger, having spent years in the drug trade.
Using a handgun, Hagen threatened a couple whose home he broke into with two other people. He thought the couple had stolen methamphetamine from him. The crime went unreported for more than a year, but the incident came to light when some of the victims were indicted on federal drug charges.
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The parole board recommended a commutation for Hagen during Noem’s first term in office, but she denied his request.
At his second commutation hearing, in September 2024, Hagen said he’d worked hard to change his life during his nearly three decades in prison.
“Something was not right with my thinking and my drug usage,” Hagen said. “I became a Christian. I’ve been heavily involved in church since I’ve been in, I’ve worked hard, kept my mind busy and tried to change, to not act like the person I used to be.”
He worked more than two decades for market wages at Metal Craft Industries, a shop operated in the South Dakota State Penitentiary’s Jameson Annex by a private company until 2024.
After moving to Springfield’s Mike Durfee State Prison, Hagen said, he used money he’d saved to invest in the stock market with the help of friends and family on the outside.
The board recommended that Hagen’s three life sentences be commuted to 60-year sentences. That would’ve made him eligible for parole at the board’s discretion next summer, and a release date of 2027 without their approval, based on credits earned for good behavior.
Rhoden granted the commutation, but did not follow the board’s advice to the letter. His order changed two of Hagen’s life sentences to 153-year sentences, and another to a 114-year sentence. Hagen is still eligible for release by the parole board in June, but wouldn’t be able to walk free without their approval until 2075.
Commutation denial
The most serious crime on Rhoden’s list of five denied clemency requests is the conviction of Dawn Frazer. She was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life for participating in the killing of Morningstar Shalimar Standing Bear in 1999 in Sturgis.
During her second commutation hearing, which took place in October 2024, a handful of parole board members expressed concerns, ranging from her downplaying her role in the incident to the crime’s severity.
The board also agreed, though, that she was “a changed woman” who’d become a mentor to others at the South Dakota women’s prison. They voted for a commutation that would have made the 57-year-old parole eligible when she turns 70.
Rhoden denied Frazier’s commutation request in a letter dated June 12.
Rhoden did not comment on any individual cases in his interview on clemency with South Dakota Searchlight. When asked more broadly about his denials, he said the time between an incident and the request has been the primary factor.
Rhoden said he wants to see that enough time has elapsed that “they truly are rehabilitated.”
Pardons and commutations issued by Gov. Larry Rhoden.