Sentencing:
US
Attorney
General
Calls
for
More
Mandatory
Minimums,
Less
Judicial
Discretion
6/24/05
Warning ominously that there has been "a drift toward lesser sentences" since the US Supreme Court upended the federal sentencing structure with its January decision making federal sentencing guidelines advisory rather than mandatory, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales called Tuesday for more mandatory minimum sentences. Cases in which federal judges sentenced people below statutory minimum sentences had increased from 7.5% of cases in 2003 to almost 13% since the Supreme Court ruling, Gonzales complained. Gonzales' fear of excessive leniency in federal sentencing comes as the federal prison population is at an all-time high of more than 184,000, with more than half of them doing time for drug offenses. Thousands are doing multi-decade sentences for nonviolent drug crimes, including many whose participation in the offenses was marginal at best. Sentences outside the guidelines have increased from 30% in 2003 to 37% since the January ruling, Gonzales said in remarks prepared for a speech to the National Center for Victims of Crime. "This trend is troubling to me and should be troubling to all victims of crime. I have come to the conclusion that the advisory guidelines system we currently have can and must be improved," he said. "Our sentencing system works best when judges have some discretion, but discretion that is bounded by mandatory sentencing guidelines created through the legislative process," Gonzales added. But for the attorney general, who was making his first remarks on the issue since he took office in February, judicial discretion would be limited to imposing higher sentences, while mandatory minimums would set rigid boundaries beyond which judges could not go.
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