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Local DA in Georgia makes pitch against sentencing guidelines and for more judicial discretion

By Douglas A. Berman

Everyone familiar with sentencing debates in the federal system knows the usual terms of modern debates over sentencing guidelines and judicial discretion: federal prosecutors are typically arguing for the federal guidelines to have more bite, while defense attorneys are typically saying that federal judges need to be afforded ample discretion to fit punishments to the unique facets of individual cases and offenders.  Sophisticated observers also know that it is the relatively severity of the federal guidelines that in large part account for why federal prosecutors like them and federal defense attorneys like judges to have ample discretion to sentencing outside these guidelines. Those long accustomed to this long-standing debate over federal sentencing dynamics should find especially interesting this local opinion piece from Georgia, headlined "D...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on February 24, 2011 (boomark / email).