However, someone convicted of the same level 8 offense but with a criminal history category of V should be sentenced to between 15 and 21 months in prison. For example, someone with a criminal history category of I convicted of a criminal offense of level 8 should be sentenced to between zero and six months in prison. The sentence that should be imposed is listed where the two intersect on the table. The criminal history categories are listed on the top and the offense levels are listed on the left. Once the offense level and the criminal history category are determined, using the Sentencing Table is easy. They are expressed in roman numerals with Category I having the fewest points and Category VI having the most points. The Guidelines have six different criminal history categories.
3 points are given for each prior conviction that resulted in a sentence greater than 13 months.Īll the points are added up and the total is used to determine the Criminal History Category of the convicted person. 2 points are given for each prior conviction that resulted in a sentence between 60 days and 13 months. 1 point is given for each prior conviction that resulted in a sentence of less than 60 days. The number of points awarded for each conviction can get technical and complicated but some examples are: To achieve this points are awarded for every prior conviction. One of the principles behind the Federal Sentencing Guidelines is that repeat offenders should be given longer prison sentences than people convicted of fewer prior criminal acts. For example, the guidelines suggest that someone convicted of a Level 1 offense should receive a prison sentence between zero and six months but someone convicted of a Level 43 offense should receive a sentence of life in prison. The higher the level, the more severe the crime is considered to be and the longer the prison sentence suggested by the guidelines is. There are 43 offense levels in the guidelines. Lesser felonies are not a part of the Federal Sentencing Guidelines. The Severity of the CrimeĮvery federal crime that is a felony or a Class A misdemeanor has an offense level associated with it. The table takes two primary factors into consideration:īoth of those factors need further explanation. This is done by using a table that tells judges what the appropriate sentencing range is for different crimes. How The Federal Sentencing Guidelines Workįor the sentencing guidelines to achieve the goal of uniformity in sentencing between federal courts, there has to be a way that judges can use them to determine how long a convicted person should be imprisoned under the circumstances of the particular case. The basic idea behind the Federal Sentencing Guidelines is that similar crimes committed under similar circumstances should be punished similarly. 
People convicted of a crime in one judge’s court would often face a much shorter or longer prison sentence than people convicted of the same crime in another judge’s court. This led to a wide disparity in sentencing.
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Before then it was mostly up to each individual judge to decide how to punish criminals convicted in the judge’s court. The guidelines were first adopted in 1987. However, that has not always been the case. In the United States, the Federal Sentencing Guidelines is the scheme most often used to punish people convicted of federal crimes. For this reason, every criminal justice system that humans have ever devised has some scheme in place for punishing those found guilty. Most people would not view the system as just and the system would do little to deter anyone else from committing crimes in the future. Such a system could conclude that someone was guilty, but would not have the ability to do anything about it. A criminal justice system without punishments for people convicted of crimes would be pointless.
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