What?

Having spent my entire former incarnation as a prosecutor solely in state court, I knew the federal sentencing guidelines were strict, but this excerpt from an article in the NY Times from Judge Donald Lay of our own 8th Circuit puts it all in perspective:

Years ago, Chief Judge James L. Oakes of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and I, as chief judge of the Eighth Circuit, sponsored a sentencing institute. At that institute, I asked the chairman of the United States Sentencing Commission why an 18-year-old who had received some drugs by mail for a friend should face a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years, under the commission's federal sentencing guidelines set by the commission. The chairman responded that because this teenager would be in prison during his 20's, the age when the likelihood of recidivism is greatest, the sentence would cut down on re-arrests."

WTF? And by that logic, shoplifting sentences should be extended as well. Hell, let's just incarcerate anyone under the age of 30 and chances are our crime rate would drop like a stone. Judge Lay goes on to say:

Mandatory minimum sentences, enacted by Congress, have contributed to the rising costs of imprisonment and crowding in federal prisons. In federal drug cases, defendants could face a minimum of 5 to 10 years in prison, while a similar offense in some state courts would allow a court, depending on the circumstances, to place the defendant on probation. Justice Anthony Kennedy and several other scholars, judges, professors and law reviews have openly criticized the use of mandatory minimum sentences in federal criminal cases. To make matters worse, a bill has been proposed in the Senate that would set a mandatory sentence of 10 years for a first drug conviction and mandatory life imprisonment for a second.

Wow.



On the one hand, I've liked the mandatory minimums we have here in Iowa for first offenses. My reasons: a) If the person's record is truly clean, you can always plead to a deferred judgment and they'll get some monitoring with no jail time, b) They aren't too stiff, the usual two days should wake up any law-abiding citizen who stepped over the line in an anomalous manner, and c) The judge can always impose something greater - up to a month for a simple misdemeanor, a year for a serious misdemeanor, and two for an aggravated misdemeanor - when warranted by facts. Minor felony convictions allow the judge less control over the actual sentence, as they are indeterminate things like "up to five years," but they can also be suspended if it is appropriate under the facts. My only complaint on the state level is that judges appear reluctant to impose anything over the minimums unless the facts of the crime are thoroughly aggregious. I've had a domestic violence case with broken ribs (the woman was kicked in the chest with steel-toed boots) go for the minimum two days/$250 fine/batterers, the same as a faint scratch from grabbing an arm. That is simply not right, IMHO.



But as the case I blogged on yesterday shows, these federal guidelines don't allow the judge to take into account the intangibles of the crime. 10 years for a first offense? I tried looking up the bill he's referring to, but a cursory read through new Senate bills didn't reveal it. If it's for first offenders who, like, gave meth to a kindergartenter or took a shot at someone, perhaps. If it's going to encompass some high school kid that orders an ounce of pot through the federal mails, as Judge Lay implies, then I've got a real problem with that. I want drugs off the street as much as the next person, but not at the expense of creating career criminals out of nominally rebellious teenagers. When the judiciary is signalling that the issue is getting way out of hand, it's time to sit up and listen.