Sentencing Along Procedural Fault Lines: What Legislative Thresholds Can Tell Us About Sentencing Research, Theory, & Policy

• In Event: Understanding Criminal Proceedings

Abstract

In the federal system two apparatuses regulate sentencing: mandatory minimums and the guidelines. The mandatory minimum system is relatively rigid, considering few (sometimes just one) case facts when determining the floor for criminal punishment. Meanwhile, the guideline system is comparatively flexible, employing a real-offense scoring system that adjusts for a battery of aggravating and mitigating factors alongside the conviction count. Importantly, tensions between these two sentencing processes are not evenly distributed across the population of cases. Rather, they saturate themselves amongst a select set of cases in the shadow of legislatively defined thresholds. The recognition that cases along these processual fault lines systemically differ from the average criminal case highlights that (amongst other things) average effects from pooled samples are much too imprecise, pressures to plead guilty are moderated by proximity to legislative action, the friction between formal and substantive rational decisionmaking varies by values of commonly analyzed independent variables, and decade long efforts to achieve consistency between statutory and guideline schemes may be easily thwarted by those inhabiting the courts. This study provides an analysis, and discusses these implications for research, theory, and policy.

Author

• Bryan Holmes, Florida State University