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Beyond Bandaids: A Proposal For Reconfiguring Federal Sentencing After Booker, Frank O. Bowman Iii

Faculty Publications

This Article proposes a simplified sentencing table consisting of nine base sentencing ranges, each subdivided into three sub-ranges. The base sentencing range would be determined by combining offense facts found by a jury or admitted in a plea with the defendant's criminal history. A defendant's placement in the sub-ranges would be determined by post-conviction judicial findings of sentencing factors. No upward departures from the base sentencing range would be permissible, but defendants might be sentenced below the low end of the base sentencing range as a result of an acceptance of responsibility credit or due to a downward departure motion. …