"pardon" is a perfectly correct and usable word in written English.
You would use it as an apology or a request for someone to repeat something they said. For example, "I'm sorry, I didn't hear you—could you please pardon me?".
Althought a death penalty for Ebrahimi was handed down by the judges, her victim's family have until the very last minute to pardon her, a decision they have so far refused.
The White House strongly condemned the prosecution and called on Egyptian government to immediately pardon hose prosecuted so they could be released.
Samereh Alinejad's act of forgiveness, has since inspired dozens of other families across Iran to pardon convicts at last minute.
At the annual turkey pardon, Malia and Sasha appeared slightly bored as they watched their father pardon birds named Mac and Cheese.
Some said there was a possibility the party would ask the president, Giorgio Napolitano, to pardon Berlusconi.
You must always pardon your enemies.
A pardon does not merely, or even usually, mean letting someone convicted of a crime go free; it can also mean commuting a sentence.
She has backed away from an earlier pledge to pardon her father, saying she would respect the decisions of the courts.
At one point he suggested he might pardon Mr Duvalier, who faced charges of mass human-rights abuses, and later on said he might welcome the reviled strongman as an adviser.
From the opening metaphor of the fox hunt, with the rich taking the role of the foxes, it evoked Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal .If you'll pardon the pun, your parody grew richer as your arguments mounted low taxes on the rich encourage investment and growth, we can make the tax code more efficient, and so on.
But a different, friendlier president might pardon Mr Nastase, whose supporters say the whole case was trumped up.Local reaction to the presidential suspension (not just from Mr Basescu's pals) has been stormy.
