Seventh and final USSC regional hearing this week in Phoenix

As detailed in this brief public notice, the US Sentencing Commission has its seventh (and I believe final) regional public hearings on tap for this coming week.  This regional public hearing is scheduled for January 20-21, 2010 in Phoenix, Arizona, at the the Sandra Day O’Connor United States Courthouse.

As detailed in this official agenda, another fascinating group of invited witnesses are scheduled to testify regarding federal sentencing policy in this regional hearing.  As has been its practice, the USSC will likely post some of the written testimony on its website soon.  As I have said before, all the regional public hearing testimony is worth reading.

Finally, I am pleased to see that this regional session includes a panel providing a "View from Academia." The first three regional hearings all included a panel of academics, but the Sentencing Commissioners subsequently became less interested in hearing about how the federal sentencing system looks from various regions of the ivory tower.  I am glad to see the scholar eggheads back in the mix this last time around.