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Future of Federal Sentencing Guidelines Discussed
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In two days of hearings November 16-17, the U.S. Sentencing Commission was urged to respond clearly, and quickly, once the Supreme Court rules on the validity of the federal sentencing guidelines. Federal judges, academics and criminal justice system lawyers said the commission should attempt to have its recommended changes to the guidelines before Congress within nine months of the Supreme Court’s anticipated rulings in a pair of guidelines cases. The high court heard arguments in the cases October 4. If Congress is not convinced a solution can be achieved relatively quickly, several witnesses testified, then the lawmakers will impose their own remedy, without waiting for any recommendation from the Sentencing Commission, which was created by Congress to issue guidelines for judges who sentence convicted criminals. The justices are expected to rule whether their decision last June, Blakely v. Washington, which struck down a state’s sentencing guidelines as unconstitutional also applies to the federal guidelines in place for 20 years. U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan of the District of Columbia, testified for the Criminal Law Committee of the policy-making Judicial Conference of the United States. He told the commission: “Although Congress clearly has the authority to define crimes and prescribe criminal sentences, the judiciary has a vital interest in any changes made to the federal sentencing process ... These hearings and the commission’s talent and hard work create an unprecedented opportunity for a thoughtful and deliberate refinement of the federal sentencing system.” Stephen Saltzburg, a George Washington University law professor who chairs an American Bar Association commission on sentencing, was among those to emphasize that the commission must move with relative speed. “If Congress thinks it will take you three years, it will act on its own,” he said. Congress is more likely to wait for the commission’s recommendation if it can be forwarded within a year, he said. |