All the latest Federal Sentencing news and analysis brought to you free by SentencingStats.com
On Monday, October 23, 2017, distinguished members of the Judiciary, past and present Commissioners, and leading scholars commemorated the original U.S. Sentencing Commission and marked the 30th Anniversary of the Sentencing Guidelines at the Hofstra University Club.
The American Bar Association’s “Criminal Justice Standards for the Defense Function” (4th ed.) strongly suggest that failure to research and cite favorable sentencing statistics may constitute ineffective assistance of counsel. In the seminal case of Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984), the U.S. Supreme Court observed that “prevailing norms of practice as reflected in the
On April 15, 2016, following last year’s important amendments to relevant conduct, mitigating role, and fraud guidelines, the U.S. Sentencing Commission voted to continue to make fundamental fixes to the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines (USSG) that have long been in need of repair. These fixes became final on November 1, 2016 During this amendment cycle, with
Law360, New York (March 3, 2017, 12:31 PM EST) — As of this writing, the confirmation hearings for Judge Neil Gorsuch, President Donald Trump’s U.S. Supreme Court nominee to fill the late Justice Antonin Scalia’s vacancy, are set to begin on March 20, 2017. This article reviews a key opinion authored by Judge Gorsuch as
Now in their 30th year, the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines (Guidelines) have been used to sentence well over 1.5 million defendants nationwide since Nov. 1, 1987, when they first went into effect. (See U.S. Sentencing Comm’n, 1996-2015 Sourcebooks on Federal Sentencing Statistics, Tbl. 10; U.S. Sentencing Comm’n, Quarterly Data Report (4th Quarter Release), Tbl. 1 (Sept.
U.S. Bureau of Prisons (BOP) policies are complex and difficult to understand— even defense lawyers find them taxing particularly so when it comes to medical and mental health issues. Clients and families are more often than not lost in the bureaucratic maze of terminology and regulations, and they turn to their lawyers for explanations. In
