Updated at 2:50 p.m. with more information about George Floyd’s parole recommendation withdrawal.

AUSTIN — Gov. Greg Abbott has granted full pardons to eight people, he announced Thursday, the most since he took office in 2015.

The pardons are a Christmas tradition for Texas governors. But conspicuously absent from Abbott’s clemency list this year is George Floyd, whose death at the hands of a law enforcement officer in Minneapolis set off worldwide protests against police brutality. In October, the Texas Board of Pardons and Parole unanimously recommended a posthumous pardon for a decade-old drug conviction, according to the Associated Press.

The board withdrew 25 recommendations for pardon, including Floyd’s, that it said “contained procedural errors and lack of compliance with Board rules.” Floyd could still be pardoned at a later date if the board recommends clemency after revisiting his application.

“The Board will review and resolve procedural errors and issues related to any pending applications in compliance with their rules. As a result of the Board’s withdrawal of the recommendation concerning George Floyd, Governor Abbott did not have the opportunity to consider it. Governor Abbott will review all recommendations that the Board submits for consideration,” Abbott spokesman Renae Eze said.

Allison Mathis, a Houston public defender who applied for a posthumous pardon for Floyd, said she had not been previously informed anything was wrong with the application and said the withdrawal “smacks of something untoward.”

She said Abbott, a Republican who faces multiple GOP challengers next year, thwarted Floyd’s pardon for political purposes.

“Greg Abbott and his political appointees have let their politics triumph over the right thing to do and what clearly is justice. This is actually outrageous,” Mathis told The Dallas Morning News. “I expected an up or a down vote. I did not expect this kind of misconduct.”

She added: “The fish rots from the head.”

Abbott’s office did not immediately respond to Mathis’ remarks.

In February 2004, Floyd was arrested in Houston in a police sting for selling $10 worth of crack, according to the Associated Press. He pleaded guilty and served 10 months in prison.

But local prosecutors have revisited this and dozens of other cases tied to Gerald Goines, a narcotics officer accused of mishandling years of arrests including a botched drug bust in 2019 that resulted in the deaths of two people. Goines, who denied the allegations, faces murder charges and more in the 2019 case. Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg has since dismissed more than 160 drug convictions tied to him.

If granted, Floyd’s would have been just the second posthumous pardon granted in Texas. The first, in 2014, went to Timothy Cole, a man wrongfully convicted of a 1985 rape. Cole died in prison in 1999, according to the Innocence Project.

Abbott attended Floyd’s Houston memorial service in 2020 and signaled he was open to working on legislation to prevent police brutality. But police accountability bills mostly fizzled during this year’s legislative session. Republicans instead made police funding a priority.

Eight pardons

None of the individuals Abbott pardoned this year appeared to have served time in the state prison system for their crimes, which included theft and income tax evasion, according to information from the governor’s office. The pardoned individuals are:

• David Boyd Pool, 74, for theft in 1965 (Galveston County). Pool was sentenced to 2 years of probation.
• Gary Lynn Dickey, 42, for burglary of a vehicle in 1997 (Washington County). Dickey was sentenced to 2 years of deferred adjudication probation.
• Christina Marie Edgar, formerly Christina Marie Emmert, 52, for theft in 2013 (Dallas County). Edgar was sentenced to 3 years of probation and a $1,500 fine.
• Subrina Sophus-Collins, formerly Subrina Maeca Sophus, 54, for unlawfully carrying a weapon on alcohol premises in 1994 (Harris County). Sophus-Collins was sentenced to 2 years of deferred adjudication probation and a $500 fine.
• Olukayode David Koleosho, 46, for robbery in 1996 (Fort Bend County). Koleosho was sentenced to 3 years of deferred adjudication probation and a $300 fine.
• David Anthony Mendes, 46, for theft in 1994 (Collin County). Mendes was sentenced to 3 years of deferred adjudication probation.
• Joe Bob Wilcoxson, 76, for theft in 2013 (Ellis County). Wilcoxson was sentenced to 3 years of probation and a $2,500 fine.
• Joseph Edward Braithwaite, 59, for evasion of income taxes in 1999 (U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York). Braithwaite was sentenced to a $150 assessment.

In a statement, the governor addressed the pardons.

“Through the gubernatorial pardon, the Governor of Texas has the unique power to grant Texans a second chance,” Abbott said. “These men and women have demonstrated their dedication to turning their lives around and helping their communities.”

Christina Edgar told The News this was her fifth time applying for executive clemency. She maintains her innocence.

“It will change everything. I gain the right to vote again. I will be able to carry a firearm again. I will gain my CPA license back again,” said Edgar, who added she is not related to former Dallas County GOP Chairman Wade Emmert. “Thank you, Gov. Abbott. It’s amazing. It’s a wonderful Christmas gift.”

Fewer pardons

Abbott has approved fewer pardons than his immediate predecessor, Rick Perry. The highest number issued in the past two decades came in 2003, when Perry granted clemency to 62 people including 35 swept up in a mass drug sting in the West Texas town of Tulia.

Dozens of people apply for executive clemency each year. The governor has the power to pardon people for any crime, except treason or impeachment, if recommended by a majority of the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles. The governor chooses the board’s members.

There are multiple kinds of clemency depending on the crime committed, from full pardon to the restoration of a driver’s license. A full pardon restores to the recipient certain rights he may have lost, including the right to serve on a jury, vote or hold public office.

Application can be made for both capital and noncapital cases. The board has rarely recommended clemency for someone convicted of a crime punishable by the death penalty. It did so once in 2018 and once last year, according to a 2020 board report. Very rarely has the governor granted clemency to someone with a felony conviction or who has committed violent crime, even when recommended by the board.

In 2018, the board recommended 21 pardons and Abbott granted six. He approved seven of the board’s 38 recommendations in 2019, and seven of the 53 in 2020.

In 2021, the board received 235 full pardon applications and recommended 67 — more than they’d done in nearly two decades. Given this “aberration,” Board Chair David Gutierrez instructed staff to “carefully examine” practices and procedures, according to a letter he sent to Abbott’s general counsel on Dec. 16.

“The examination has revealed that the Board made a number of unexplained departures from its own rules in issuing many of its 2021 recommendations,” wrote Gutierrez, who then cited sections pertaining to pardons for innocence, misdemeanors and for those still in prison.

Gutierrez requested Abbott let them rescind “and reconsider” several applications, including Floyd’s.

Mathis received a letter from the board of Pardons and Paroles after Abbott made public his pardons on Thursday.

“Your client will not be required to reapply for a full pardon in two years as the Board will review your client’s case in the near future. However, after reviewing your case, you may be required to provide additional information,” the letter read. “You will be notified of the results of the reconsideration.”