The Board has authority under state statute to issue parole to offenders who have served a certain percentage of their sentences, as well as to revoke parole privileges for parolees who fail to follow the rules and standards established for them as conditions of release.
Governor Winfield Dunn appointed Charles Traughber as the first chairman and Dorothy Greer and Joseph Mitchell as the other charter members.
[3] In the 1970s, the Board of Pardons and Paroles had a central role in the cash-for-clemency scandal in the administration of Governor Ray Blanton.
Marie Ragghianti, whom Blanton had appointed to chair the Board of Pardons and Paroles, was removed from her position as chairwoman in August 1977 after she refused a request to release certain prisoners who were later found to have bribed members of the Blanton administration to obtain their release.
Ragghianti's story later gained national attention as the subject of Peter Maas' book Marie and the 1985 movie of the same name.