Three people convicted of federal crimes in Maine but who no longer live in the state are among 78 people nationwide who were pardoned Monday by President Barack Obama, according to information released by the White House.
The cases are in addition to two pardons reported Monday by the Bangor Daily News, in which Camden resident Francis J. O’Hara and Robert Spencer Baines of South Thomaston were granted clemency for past federal convictions — a drug distribution conspiracy in Baines’ case and, for O’Hara, an interstate scheme to rig seafood contracts with the U.S. Department of Defense.
Among the ex-Mainers pardoned by Obama is former Lamoine resident Donald Lee Gilbert, who was 18 years old when he pleaded guilty in 1964 to transporting a stolen car from Providence, Rhode Island, to his hometown; and Caryn L. Camp, formerly of South Portland, who was 37 years old and working for Idexx Laboratories in 1998 when she deliberately sent proprietary information about the company to a potential competitor.
Also pardoned Monday was George Bernard Moran, who now lives in Federal Way, Washington. Moran was convicted in federal court in Maine in 1984 of conspiracy to import a substantial amount of marijuana into the United States, conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute an amount of marijuana over 1,000 pounds, and subscribing to a false United States Income Tax Return.
Camp, who lives in Taiwan, used email, the U.S. Postal Service and private shipping companies to send internal Idexx documents including procedures, laboratory information, customer lists, sales reports and other information a man she had met on the Internet, the Associated Press reported in 1998. The scheme unraveled when Camp accidentally sent an email intended for the man to a co-worker.
Camp thought she was sending the information to a businessman and potential employer but later found out the recipient was a “dreamer” with a long beard and tie-dyed clothes who lived with his mother and drove a VW van, according to the Associated Press.
Camp later pleaded guilty to 10 counts of wire fraud, two counts of mail fraud, conspiracy to steal trade secrets, conspiracy to transport stolen goods and interstate transportation of stolen goods, according to information released Monday by the White House. She was sentenced to serve three years probation and to pay $7,500 in restitution to her former employer.
Gilbert, who now lives in Phoenix, Arizona, received a sentence in 1964 of two years probation after pleading guilty to a charge of interstate transport of a stolen vehicle.
According to federal court documents, Gilbert went AWOL while serving in the Navy on July 31, 1964 — the same day he stole a 1957 Chevrolet automobile. At the time, he had a 7-month-old daughter and 17-year-old wife, with whom he was expecting another child, the documents indicate.
A transcript of the Oct. 19, 1964 hearing in federal court in Bangor at which Gilbert pleaded guilty indicates that Gilbert was facing state charges in Rhode Island for having stolen the car and was expected to be charged with desertion by the Navy. A military police officer with the Navy’s Shore Patrol told Judge Edward T. Gignoux during the hearing that the Navy planned to take Gilbert into custody and transport him to its facility at the Brunswick Naval Air Station following the hearing.
Attempts this week to track down additional details about the activities that led to criminal convictions for Gilbert and Moran have been unsuccessful. The Department of Justice on Tuesday declined a request from the Bangor Daily News to release additional information about the crimes for which Obama granted the pardons or about the clemency requests.
