Judges' written testimony to USSC

District Judge Paul Cassell, who serves as chair of the Criminal Law Committee of the Judicial Conference, had forwarded to me the written testimony submitted to the US Sentencing Commission for consideration in its March 20, 2007 public hearing. This written testimony takes the form of a letter that can be downloaded below (and apparently Judge Reggie Walton, who spoke on behalf of the Committee at the USSC hearing yesterday, gave remarks that tracked the points made in the written submission).

Here is the first paragraph of the CLC's written testimony:

The Criminal Law Committee of the Judicial Conference is pleased to respond to the U.S. Sentencing Commission’s Notice of Proposed Amendments, Request for Public Comment, and Notice of Public Hearings for the amendment cycle ending May 1, 2007. While the Committee recognizes that the Commission is considering several important revisions to the guidelines, we would like to focus on one issue that we believe impacts the fair administration of justice.  Specifically, the Committee believes that when the Commission is promulgating base offense levels for guidelines used for offenses with mandatory minimums, the Commission should set the base offense level irrespective of the mandatory minimum term of imprisonment that may be imposed by statute.

Download clc_written_testimony_final.pdf