Two prisoners who are among the 37 federal inmates whose death sentences were commuted last month by President Joe Biden — a move that spares them from the death chamber — have taken an unusual stance: They’re refusing to sign paperwork accepting his clemency action. Shannon Agofsky and Len Davis, both inmates at the U.S. Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana, filed emergency motions in federal court in the state’s southern district on Dec. 30 seeking an injunction to block having their death sentences commuted to life in prison without parole. The men believe that having their sentences commuted would put them at a legal disadvantage as they seek to appeal their cases based on claims of innocence. Death penalty appeals get looked at by the courts very closely in a legal process known as heightened scrutiny, in which courts should examine death penalty cases for errors because of the life and death consequences of the sentence. The process doesn’t necessarily lead to a greater likelihood of success, but Agofsky suggested he doesn’t want to lose that additional scrutiny. “To commute his sentence now, while the defendant has active litigation in court, is to strip him of the protection of heightened scrutiny. This constitutes an undue burden, and leaves the defendant in a position of fundamental unfairness, which would decimate his pending appellate procedures,” according to Agofsky’s filing. Davis wrote in his filing that he “has always maintained that having a death sentence would draw attention to the overwhelming misconduct” he alleges against the Justice Department. He also wrote that he “thanks court for its prompt attention to this fast-moving constitutional conundrum. The case law on this issue is quite murky.” But inmates face a daunting challenge in having their death sentences restored, said Dan Kobil, a professor of constitutional law at Capital University Law School in Columbus, Ohio, who has represented defendants in death penalty and clemency cases. A 1927 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, for example, maintains that a president has the power to grant reprieves and pardons, and “the convict’s consent is not required.” There are instances of prisoners who have refused a commutation because they would rather be executed, Kobil said, but just like “we impose sentences for the public welfare, the president and governors in states commute sentences for the public welfare.” Robin Maher, executive director of the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center, added that the vast majority of inmates on federal death row were grateful for Biden’s decision, “which is constitutionally authorized and absolute.” The Justice Department’s Office of the Pardon Attorney did not immediately respond Monday to a request for comment. Agofsky was convicted in the 1989 murder of an Oklahoma bank president, Dan Short, whose body was found in a lake. Federal prosecutors said Agofsky and his brother, Joseph Agofsky, abducted and killed Short before stealing $71,000 from his bank. A jury declined to convict Joseph Agofsky of murder but he received a life sentence for the robbery, while Shannon Agofsky received a life sentence on murder and robbery charges. Joseph Agofsky died in prison in 2013. Shannon Agofsky, while incarcerated in a Texas prison, was convicted in the 2001 stomping death of a fellow inmate, Luther Plant, and a jury recommended a death sentence in 2004. In his filing seeking an injunction for Biden’s commutation, Agofsky, 53, said that he is disputing how he was charged with murder in the stomping death and that he is also trying to “establish his innocence in the original case for which he was incarcerated.” “The defendant never requested commutation. The defendant never filed for commutation,” the filing says. “The defendant does not want commutation, and refused to sign the papers offered with the commutation.” Agofsky’s wife, Laura, who married him in 2019 in a ceremony over the phone, said Monday that his lawyers had urged him to request a presidential commutation in his case, but he refused because his status as a death row inmate afforded him legal counsel that is critical in his appeals. Though, Laura Agofsky said her husband still has lawyers who are helping him. Solely having his sentence commuted is “not a win for him,” she said because she believes there is evidence that can prove his innocence. “He doesn’t want to die in prison being labeled a cold-blooded killer,” Laura Agofsky said in a phone interview. Davis, a former New Orleans police officer, was convicted in the 1994 murder of Kim Groves, who had filed a complaint against him accusing him of beating a teenager in her Lower Ninth Ward neighborhood. Prosecutors said Davis hired a drug dealer to kill Groves and charged the officer with violating Groves’ civil rights. Davis’ original death sentence was thrown out by a federal appeals court, but was reinstated in 2005. The case was part of a sprawling federal investigation into corruption within the New Orleans police force. Davis, 60, “has always maintained his innocence and argued that federal court had no jurisdiction to try him for civil rights offenses,” his filing says. Both Davis and Agofsky are asking a judge to appoint a co-counsel in their requests for an injunction of the commutations. Maher, of the Death Penalty Information Center, said all people accused of a federal crime have a constitutional right to counsel for trial as well as in an appeal if they are convicted, regardless of whether it’s death row case. “Death sentences are the most extreme sanction that can be given in a criminal case, and they deserve the highest quality legal representation and judicial scrutiny,” Maher said. Biden’s decision to commute the sentences of 37 of the 40 federal death row prisoners, all men, came after weeks of speculation. He was praised by a coalition of human rights and anti-death penalty groups that have expressed opposition to President-elect Donald Trump’s pledge to expand federal executions in his second term. The Justice Department under Biden imposed a moratorium on executions. “I am more convinced than ever that we must stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level,” Biden said in a statement announcing the commutation. “In good conscience, I cannot stand back and let a new administration resume executions that I halted.” Biden, however, declined to grant commutations to three federal death row prisoners who were involved in either mass killings or terrorist attacks. Still, the president has faced criticism for commuting the sentences of the 37 others. The Office of the Independent Police Monitor in New Orleans, a civilian police oversight agency created in 2009, said commuting Davis’ death sentence is “a painful reminder that justice is not always served as it should be.” “In this action, President Biden showed more mercy for Davis than this corrupt officer ever showed for Kim Groves, her children and family, and the people of New Orleans,” the office said in a statement. Laura Agofsky, a German citizen who first connected with her husband as pen pals and has yet to meet him in person, said she realizes that reversing the commutation is an uphill battle, but he remains focused on appealing his case. “We’ve been talking about the possibility of a commutation ever since Biden was elected, given his past statements about the death penalty,” said Laura Agofsky, who has become an advocate for her husband and works with the German Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. (Germany does not have capital punishment.) While Biden’s announcement was “a very black day for us,” she added, “now, with the knowledge he will keep his lawyers, we know they will fight for him.” This story first appeared on NBCNews.com. More from NBC News: U.S. records its first human bird flu death Fluoride once again scrutinized for possible effect on children’s brains It’s Black Monday in pro football, as the bill comes due for coaches of losing NFL teams