On January 22, 2025, in his first week back in office, Trump granted full and unconditional pardons to two former District of Columbia police officers, Terence Sutton and Lt. Andrew Zabavsky, wiping out convictions tied to the 2020 death of 20-year-old Karon Hylton-Brown and its cover-up.
On October 23, 2020, Sutton led an unauthorized high-speed pursuit of Hylton-Brown, who was riding a moped without a helmet through Northwest Washington. Hylton-Brown was struck by another car and killed. A federal jury convicted Sutton of second-degree murder, the first time a D.C. officer had been convicted of murder for on-duty conduct, along with obstruction and conspiracy. Zabavsky, a supervisor, was convicted of conspiracy and obstruction for helping cover up what happened, including failing to properly report the incident and downplaying it to superiors. Sutton was sentenced to roughly 66 months in prison and Zabavsky to 48 months.
The pardons, which followed lobbying by the D.C. Police Union, erased both convictions. The ACLU of D.C. condemned them, and the case became one of the earliest examples of Trump using the clemency power to nullify a jury verdict in a police-killing case. It resurfaced in late July 2026 in coverage revisiting his pardon record (see January 6 Pardons).