After years of advocating for the release of rapper and music producer John Edward Forte, Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch said Tuesday that he supports President Bush's decision to commute Forte's 14-year sentence for drug possession.

Hatch had written a letter to the president on Forte's behalf, helped arrange to have the former member of The Fugees incarcerated closer to his home in New Jersey, and to allow Forte to have his guitar while in prison, according to reports.

"Several officials and experienced lawyers believed Mr. Forte's sentence was worthy of a commutation and advocated for such," Hatch said in a statement. "I can only assume the president reviewed the case, saw that justice had been met and thought a commutation was appropriate. In this case, I concur with the president's decision."

Forte is a rapper and music producer who contributed work to The Fugees' Grammy-winning 1996 album, The Score. He released solo work with less success.

In 2001, Forte was arrested at the Newark airport in possession of 31 pounds of liquid cocaine, with an estimated street value of $1.4 million. Under federal minimum mandatory sentencing laws, the judge sent Forte to prison for 14 years.

The case caught the attention of singer Carly Simon, whose son, Ben Taylor, met Forte when he was enrolled in the Phillips Exeter Academy, a New Hamphsire boarding school, where Forte was studying violin.

Simon appealed to Hatch for help. In her official blog, she wrote that Hatch arranged to allow Forte to serve his sentence at Fort Dix, N.J., nearer to his hometown, rather than in Philadelphia. The Boston Globe reported that Hatch also arranged for Forte to have his guitar while in prison.

"Now is the perfect opportunity for John to be given the chance to provide positive benefits to society through his considerable musical talents," Hatch wrote in a January 2007 letter to Bush, according to The Washington Post.

Hatch's spokesman, Mark Eddington, would not discuss specifically what steps the senator took to assist Forte and would not provide a copy of the letter Hatch wrote.

"A majority of Utahns agree that drug traffickers deserve to feel the full weight of justice and to be locked up until they can live under the rule of law," Hatch said in a statement. "As the author of several laws which create tough penalties for drug offenses and other crimes, I know how hard it can be to strike the right balance to effectuate corrective behavior. Even the best judges struggle with these issues."

Forte had served about half his sentence when Bush commuted the term Monday night. He is scheduled to be released by December 22, but will remain on probation for five years.

University of Utah law professor Paul Cassell, a former federal judge and an outspoken critic of mandatory minimum sentences, says the sentencing requirements are pegged to things like the amount of drugs or number of people involved in a crime. "They don't consider very well things like how much culpability the individual has in the scheme," he said, adding that appears to be a failing in the Forte case.

Cassell wants the mandatory sentences repealed and judges given discretion, "because I think they lead to one-size-fits-all injustice."

Hatch has also said that mandatory minimum sentences need to be reviewed.

Hatch is a musician by hobby , has written songs for several of his own albums and had his work appear on compilation albums and movie soundtracks, as well. He has a platinum record hanging in his Washington office that he received for helping to co-write the Christian pop song, "Unspoken."

In 2005, Hatch was in the front row at a Simon concert in Washington, where Simon performed one of the senator's songs and referred to him as "the King of The Hill," according to The Post.

Forte's case was not the first in which Hatch has intervened.

President Clinton, on the last day of his term and at Hatch's urging, commuted the sentence of Utahn Cory Stringfellow, who had been busted for selling drugs and then forging a passport to try to escape authorities.

And in 2006, Hatch intervened to help get Grammy-winning record producer Dallas Austin out of a prison in Dubai after he was arrested there on a drug charge. Austin and Hatch are represented by the same law firm.?