Session’s Directive to Seek Harshest Sentencing Rescinded
by Kevin Bliss
Acting Attorney General Monty Wilkinson recently issued a memo to the Department of Justice (DOJ) rescinding a Trump-era policy of seeking the highest charges and the longest sentence possible for offenders in all criminal cases.
In 2013, Former Attorney General Eric Holder ordered federal prosecutors to refrain from charging low-level drug offenders with charges that sparked long mandatory sentences. C.J. Ciaramella, writing for the news outlet Reason, stated that it was “was an attempt to mitigate some of the notoriously harsh drug sentences that the federal guidelines and sentencing laws created.”
In 2017, attorney general for the Trump administration, Jeff Sessions, sought to reestablish harsh sentencing measures. He ordered federal prosecutors to seek out the highest charge and toughest sentencing possible in every case. Any prosecutor seeking a downward departure sentence was required to obtain approval from his supervisor. ‘‘We are returning to the enforcement of the laws as passed by Congress, plain and simple,’’ said Sessions at the time. ‘‘If you are a drug trafficker, we will not look the other way, we will not be willfully blind to your misconduct.’’
Sessions inappropriately blamed the 2015 to 2016 rise in crime on Holder’s directive, “may have led to shorter sentences for only around 500 federal drug offenders each year.”
On January 29, 2021, Wilkinson rescinded Session’s directive, issuing one of his own, allowing prosecutors to once again exercise their discretion on a case-by-case basis. ‘‘The goal of this interim step is to ensure that decisions about charging, plea agreements, and advocacy at sentencing are based on the merits of each case and reflect individualized assessments of relevant facts while longer-term policy is formulated,’’ read a portion of the memo.
A DOJ spokesperson released the following statement to the media concerning the directive: ‘‘The Acting Attorney General’s interim guideline replaces a directive that made it difficult for prosecutors to exercise their traditional discretion and to pursue justice in a case-by-case basis. The interim guidance returns to the well-established approach of emphasizing that prosecutorial decisions should be made after a careful consideration of the particular facts and circumstances of individual criminal cases.’’
Other policies enacted during the Trump administration could also be in danger of being rescinded. One such policy is Session’s removal of restrictions to federal authorities use of ‘‘adopting’’ state forfeiture proceedings placed there by the Obama administration as it was used primarily as a means of circumventing harsher state forfeiture laws.
Source: reason.com
As a digital subscriber to Criminal Legal News, you can access full text and downloads for this and other premium content.
Already a subscriber? Login
