The laws and guidelines governing federal sentencing have two things in common: uncertainty and complexity. This was made clear last July 24, 2023, when the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals decided United States v. Vargas. The en banc court dealt…
Category: federal Sentencing
2024
Category: Federal Criminal Law | federal Sentencing
A defendant’s federal sentencing memorandum aims to secure the best sentence possible for the defendant. Its value lies in the opportunity the memo gives criminal defense attorneys to put forth mitigating factors about the defendant’s background, family, social and economic…
2024
Category: Federal Criminal Law | federal Sentencing
FEDERAL SENTENCING: AN ALWAYS UNCERTAIN LANDSCAPE
The Sentencing Reform Act (SRA) was part of the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984. The SRA abolished the federal parole system, replaced indeterminate sentencing with determinate sentencing, eliminated rehabilitation as a primary sentencing…
2023
Category: federal Sentencing | Illegal Pornography | Sex Crimes Against Children
Sentencing disparity is systemic in the American judicial system. There are three primary causes for this disparity: race, economic status, and judicial bias.
White judges generally impose harsher sentences on offenders of color; all judges are typically more lenient on…
2021
Category: Criminal Justice Reform | federal Sentencing
As of August 11, 2021, 570 people had been arrested in connection with the January 6 insurrectionist takeover and plundering of the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. Thirty-six of the defendants have pled guilty after reaching “plea deals” with…
2020
Category: Corruption | Federal Criminal Law | federal Sentencing
The term “in the interests of justice” is difficult to define precisely. Prosecutors, attorneys, and judges all have a different perspective of what serves the interests of justice.
On May 7, 2020, U.S. Attorney General William Barr invoked the “interests…
2020
Category: Federal Criminal Law | federal Sentencing
Former New York City financier Bernie Madoff is serving a 150-year term in the federal prison system following guilty pleas to multiple charges involving a $20 billion Ponzi scheme that bilked a wide range of celebrities, charities, financial funds, friends…
2020
Category: Criminal Justice Reform | federal Sentencing
In August 2017, Willie Nash was arrested on misdemeanor charges and placed in the Newton County Jail in Decatur, Mississippi. Nash was in possession of a cellphone at the time of his arrest. During the booking process, jailers either didn’t…
2018
Category: Drug Distribution | Drug Manufacturing | Drug Trafficking | federal Sentencing
The federal sentencing scheme is fundamentally unfair. The unfairness is rooted in the fixed mandatory minimums required by law. While the 1986 Anti-Drug Abuse Act was intended to apply mandatory minimum sentences to “major” or “serious” drug traffickers, a 2017…
2018
Category: federal Sentencing | Illegal Pornography
Child pornography evokes intense feelings of contempt and bias against those whom such charges are leveled.
Illustrative of this contempt is the 50-year prison term imposed on a Rockwall, Texas man by U.S. District Court Judge Sidney A. Fitzwater,…