Rethinking Criminal History in Sentencing Guidelines: Reform Efforts in Minnesota and Pennsylvania

• In Event: Sentencing Guidelines in Practice: Criminal History, Departures, and Reform Impacts in Minnesota

Abstract

A large body of research shows that the severity of criminal sentences turns primarily on (1)
the seriousness of the current conviction and (2) the defendant’s record of prior convictions.
Most American sentencing guidelines systems have codified this pattern in the form of two-
dimensional guidelines grids. Yet we have not done enough to examine the underlying
justifications of “criminal history score” computations across guidelines systems, and little
empirical research has been done to test the costs and benefits of different approaches. On a
broader level, the fundamental impact of criminal history on changing prison rates across states
has been largely ignored. This presentation focuses on recent efforts in Minnesota and
Pennsylvania to reconceive the place of criminal history in guidelines formulations of
“presumptive” or recommended sentences. These “comprehensive reviews” have been informed
by philosophical debate, empirical research, qualitative studies, decades of historical research
into sentencing patterns, and the close study of outcomes in individual case scenarios.
Importantly, almost any change in a state’s existing approach to criminal history carries
predictable long-term effects (upward or downward) on racial disparities in the use and duration
of prison sentences. The slow adoption of “demographic impact projections” in American states
provides a new signpost for the direction of future sentencing reforms.

Author

• Kevin Reitz, University of Minnesota School of Law