Sentencing Guidelines

WHEN CONGRESS reformed the way federal judges impose criminal sentences, its aim in the mid-1980s was to ensure similar sentences for like crimes. But the federal guidelines haven't always produced equitable sentences. And a majority of the Supreme Court recognized last week that there is a constitutional problem with the system. An Illinois case argued before the court focused on a central flaw of the system that demands redress. After a Chicago jury convicted Freddie J. Booker of possessing 500 grams of cocaine, a judge, in accordance with the guidelines, increased his sentence by eight years based on evidence that a jury never considered.

A 19-year-old man was sentenced to prison Friday morning after the girl he sexually assaulted in a Woodlawn roller rink told the judge that since the crime she's been harassed, gotten into fights with schoolmates and become increasingly angry. "I'm not myself anymore. I was deprived of who I am because of what they did," the victim said. Kadeem R. Santiful, one of three males charged in the assault on the girl, who was 12 when the incident occurred at Skateworks in August 2010, was sentenced to 20 years, with 10 years suspended and credit for 17 months of time already served in jail and on home detention.

WASHINGTON -- Emboldened by support from a growing number of federal judges, Attorney General Janet Reno has begun to take the first steps toward reversing the policy of meting out tough criminal sentences for minor drug offenses.In recent days, she has told some groups that she will soon order a review of the federal sentencing guidelines with an eye toward eliminating the long mandatory sentences for low-level drug crimes, like possession of small amounts of narcotics. She is expected to discuss the review on Friday at a conference on national drug strategy attended by officials from the Reagan, Bush and Clinton administrations.

Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein is warning that a recent revision to the federal sentencing guidelines for crack and powder cocaine possession will lead to the release of hundreds of dangerous criminals onto the streets. But before crying wolf about a new crime wave, he ought to consider federal prosecutors' role in creating what he describes as an impending disaster. The fact is, most of the people currently in prison for drug violations aren't there because they committed violent crimes.

Charging that new sentencing guidelines are too lenient, a group of Maryland prosecutors will ask judges not to use the guidelines until the issue is aired at public hearings."

Despite a record increase in the federal prison population and continuing evidence of sentencing disparities, the first major assessment of the U.S. government's controversial new guidelines for criminal sentencing concludes that the system is working adequately."

No one claims that David Moe Robinson is a good guy. Certainly not federal prosecutors. Not the judge. Not even his lawyer.Robinson is a convicted drug dealer who once fired a gunshot through the window of a former associate's home to "send a message" about what happens to people who don't pay cocaine debts on time.Now, he is in the cross-fire of an escalating war of words over federal sentencing guidelines, which in effect transferred the authority of federal judges to prosecutors five years ago to eliminate sentencing disparities.

A Maryland federal judge yesterday joined a growing list of jurists who say the sentencing guidelines that have long determined federal defendants' prison terms are unconstitutional. U.S. District Judge Catherine C. Blake's comments came as she gave a life sentence to Aaron DeMarco Foster, 24, one of the three men convicted in April of operating a murderous drug gang named after the now-razed Lexington Terrace housing complex. Although Blake's stance is far from unique -- judges across the country, including some in Maryland, have said the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in Blakely vs. Washington eradicates the guidelines -- her position in this high-profile case reflects what many lawyers see as mounting pressure on the nation's highest court to clarify what is a key component of federal criminal law. "Until the Supreme Court addresses the specific issue of whether its decision in Blakely has rendered the sentencing guidelines unconstitutional, lower courts are going to continue to struggle with the question of what is left of the guidelines," said Gregg L. Bernstein, a Baltimore defense lawyer.

Allowing federal judges great leeway in sentencing criminals does not have to breed chaos, according to judges and sentencing specialists in states that already have such systems. When the Supreme Court said Wednesday that federal sentencing guidelines were merely advisory, many prosecutors and lawmakers predicted federal judges would start issuing wildly inconsistent sentences based on little more than sentiment and whim. But the handful of states that already use such systems have produced notable conformity.

WASHINGTON -- In commuting the jail sentence of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby Jr., President Bush said the former vice presidential aide had suffered enough and the 30-month prison term ordered by a federal judge was "excessive." But records show the Justice Department under the Bush administration frequently has sought sentences as long, or longer, in cases similar to Libby's. Three-fourths of the 198 defendants sentenced in federal court last year for obstruction of justice - one of four crimes for which Libby was found guilty by a jury last March - got some jail time.

Dwuan Dent and Antwan Askia were on opposite sides of an East Baltimore drug turf war in the 1990s that killed at least four people, according to federal prosecutors who charged Dent with murder and conspiracy and Askia with various drug counts. Both were convicted only of drug distribution charges, but because of tough-on-crime guidelines that imposed greater penalties for crack than powder cocaine, Dent was sentenced to more than 17 years in prison and Askia to 20. Now Dent and Askia are among scores of prisoners across the country who are being released early — the beneficiaries of efforts to change those sentencing guidelines that critics say disproportionately affected low-income people and minorities who faced longer prison terms for crack-cocaine charges.

A 21-year-old Pasadena man pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter Thursday for shoving a stranger who couldn't swim into the Inner Harbor in 2008 — an act previously characterized by one Baltimore judge as complete stupidity. Wayne Black, who was 18 when he pushed 22-year-old Ankush Gupta into the water and ran, will be sentenced to four years in prison at his sentencing, scheduled for Aug. 30, per an agreement cut with Baltimore Circuit Judge M. Brooke Murdock. His mother dabbed tears from her eyes as the deal was done, while Gupta's friends and family sat stone-faced on the other side of the courtroom.

A Waldorf man convicted of trying to kill his pregnant girlfriend, a Crofton hairdresser, was given a life sentence Tuesday by an Anne Arundel County judge. Prosecutors contended Charles Brandon Martin, 33, sent a letter from his jail cell after he was convicted in the 2008 shooting that disabled Jodi Torok that sought to have the man acquitted of being the triggerman killed. Jail officials intercepted the letter and gave it to prosecutors. The letter was authenticated by a Maryland State Police expert, over the objection of the defense, at the hearing before Judge Pamela L. North.

Despite the pleas of friends and relatives, including the parents of his victim, a 38-year-old Laurel man was sentenced to 20 years in prison Thursday for scalding his then-2-year-old niece and leaving her legs and feet permanently scarred. Michael Adegoke Oye-Adeniran's pastor, a military pastor and the girls' parents all told Howard County Circuit Judge Timothy J. McCrone that the Nigerian national didn't intentionally injure the toddler. Then Oye-Adeniran himself begged McCrone for mercy.

A 37-year-old Annapolis man was sentenced Monday to 15 years in prison for the second-degree murder of his wife's nephew after the toddler died of head injuries while the man was baby-sitting him. "I don't know what sentence would adequately match this offense, but 15 years doesn't do it," Anne Arundel County Circuit Judge J. Michael Wachs said, as he accepted the agreement prosecutors made with the defense because of witness and proof problems with...

WASHINGTON -The Obama administration signaled a sharp departure Wednesday from 20 years of federal policy and called on Congress to close the huge disparity in prison sentences for those dealing crack versus powdered cocaine, agreeing with critics who say it is unfair to African-Americans. Newly confirmed Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer said the administration believes the so-called mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines are so inherently unfair that they have undermined trust in the country's judicial institutions, particularly among minorities who bear the brunt of the law. Breuer and other witnesses testifying before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee said the policies, launched when authorities feared crack was becoming an epidemic in the mid-1980s, are based on faulty assumptions that have long since been discredited, including that crack users were far more violent and dangerous to the community than powder cocaine users.

Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein is warning that a recent revision to the federal sentencing guidelines for crack and powder cocaine possession will lead to the release of hundreds of dangerous criminals onto the streets. But before crying wolf about a new crime wave, he ought to consider federal prosecutors' role in creating what he describes as an impending disaster. The fact is, most of the people currently in prison for drug violations aren't there because they committed violent crimes.

Police identify victims of fatal shootings Yesterday, police identified three men found fatally shot Wednesday in separate locations in the city and whose deaths appear to be unrelated. No arrests had been made. Shortly before 3 a.m., Eastern District police found Demetrius M. Saulsbury, 22, of the 3400 block of Elmley Ave., in the 1700 block of N. Washington St. in the Broadway East neighborhood suffering from a bullet wound to the head. He died a short time later at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

MIAMI -- Alleged "dirty bomb" plotter Jose Padilla and two co-defendants were engaged in terrorism when they conspired to fight in foreign holy wars and should spend 30 years to life in prison, a federal judge ruled yesterday. The sentencing guidelines imposed by U.S. District Judge Marcia G. Cooke seemed to indicate that, at least in the case of Padilla, she would heed prosecutors' call for life without parole. A jury convicted Padilla, 37, and his co-defendants in August of conspiracy to murder, maim or kidnap persons abroad and material support to terrorism.