Sentencing in Criminal Justice Systems
Sentencing Philosophies:
The United States Sentencing Commission (USSC) has several purposes, among them to: a) "establish sentencing priorities and practices for the federal courts"; b) help the executive branch and Congress as they develop crime policies; and c) to serve as a source of reliable data for the counts, Congress, the public, the scholarly community (www.ussc.gov). The USSC guidelines (philosophy) seek to establishing sentencing strategies that "incorporate the purposes of sentencing" through "just punishment, deterrence, incapacitation, and rehabilitation." The USSC guidelines also are aimed at providing "certainty and fairness" within the parameters of "judicial flexibility" (www.ussc.gov).
The philosophy of sentencing -- based on the USSC guidelines -- is based on taking into account "…both the seriousness of the criminal conduct and the defendant's criminal record," according to the USSC. After looking closely at the severity of the offense, the USSC guidelines "assign most federal crimes to one of 43 'offense levels'… [and] each offender is also assigned to one of six 'criminal history categories' based on the extent and recency of his or her past conduct" (www.ussc.gov). The "criminal history category" and the USSC's sentencing table intersect at some point, and judges are urged to "choose a sentence from within the guideline range," the USSC informational material points out.
Factors that go into determination of each sentence:
According to Find Law,...
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