Biden commutes sentence of Leonard Peltier, Indigenous activist convicted in 1975 killings of 2 FBI agents | National & World [Video]

(CNN) — In one of his last acts before leaving office, former President Joe Biden commuted the life sentence of Indigenous activist Leonard Peltier, convicted in the 1975 killings of two FBI agents.

Peltier, 80, will serve the remainder of his sentence at home.

“It’s finally over – I’m going home,” Peltier said in a statement shared by NDN Collective, an Indigenous rights group in South Dakota. “I want to show the world I’m a good person with a good heart. I want to help the people, just like my grandmother taught me.”

Peltier was denied parole last year. At his parole hearing, Peltier’s attorneys highlighted his failing health, age and nonviolent record during his nearly 50 years in prison.

He consistently maintained his innocence in the agents’ shooting deaths. Jack Coler and Ronald Williams, were killed in a shootout June 26, 1975, while searching for a robbery suspect on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota.

The agents …