Judge Young's latest take on modern federal sentencing dynamics

Last week, US District Judge William Young of the District of Massachusetts issued another interesting (and lengthy) opinion about the modern state of federal sentencing in United States v. West, No. 06-10281 (D. Mass. May 7, 2008) (available here).  Judge Young's sentencing work always merits attention, and West does not disappoint.  There is too much ground covered in West to allow a simple summary, but here is a starting paragraph to provide a flavor of what follows:

Here, the derivation of the particular sentence imposed is fairly straight forward.  Nevertheless, as the consequences of disparagement and delay evident in this case so well demonstrate two particularly unfortunate and persistent artifacts of that now thoroughly discredited oxymoron — mandatory guidelines — a decent respect for sentencing consistency requires that I frankly admit my own complicity in such unfortunate persistence and explain how my institutional approach to criminal sentencing has evolved.