Gov. Deval Patrick’s convicted drug dealer cousin was among eight people whose hefty sentences were commuted yesterday by President Obama, who cited a disparity in penalties for crack cocaine.

Reynolds Allen Wintersmith Jr., 39, is serving a life sentence for drug trafficking and has been imprisoned since 1994.

Patrick’s office said in a statement: “Mr. Wintersmith is the Governor’s first cousin. The Governor has no recollection of meeting Mr. Wintersmith (they are quite far apart in age), and believes that if they did meet it would have been when Mr. Wintersmith was a small boy. The Governor was not involved in any application for a commutation of Mr. Wintersmith’s sentence, and only learned of the commutation through today’s media reports.

Wintersmith’s case had been adopted by advocates and crusading attorneys. All eight inmates were sentenced under old federal guidelines that treated convictions for crack cocaine offenses more harshly than those involving the powder form of the drug. Obama also pardoned 13 others for various crimes.

The president signed the Fair Sentencing Act in 2010 to cut penalties for crack cocaine offenses in order to reduce the disparity. But the act addressed only new cases, not old ones.

Obama said those whose sentences he commuted yesterday have served at least 15 years in prison, many under mandatory minimums that required judges to impose long sentences even if they didn’t think the time fit the crime.

“If they had been sentenced under the current law, many of them would have already served their time and paid their debt to society,” Obama said in a written statement. “Instead, because of a disparity in the law that is now recognized as unjust, they remain in prison, separated from their families and their communities, at a cost of millions of taxpayer dollars each year.”

In August, Attorney General Eric Holder announced a major shift in federal sentencing policies, targeting long mandatory terms.