The Sentencing Commission has finally published their proposal for the 8th Edition Sentencing Guidelines. Sentencing Guidelines define a recommended sentencing range for a defendant based on charge and defendant characteristics. Basically, the guidelines set out a number of years someone can be incarcerated for an offense. Find attached the proposal along with the public hearing dates. They begin February 22, 2022 and end March 9, 2022.
The commission is holding six (6) public hearings. However, based on previous experience, not many of the commission members attend the in-person public hearings. The ACLU is advising folks to either register to testify virtually at the March 4, 2022 hearing OR virtually/in-person at the March 9, 2022 meeting in Harrisburg. If you are testifying in-person please make sure to register with Cathy Dittman (814-863-5729 or cwd2@psu.edu).
Folks are more than welcome to attend the February in person hearings if those dates suit your schedule better.
If you know anyone interested in testifying (no experience necessary!), please reach out to Marianne Stein at the ACLU-PA, mstein@aclupa.org. The ACLU-PA is working on analyzing the guidelines and will create talking points to share with partners. Stay tuned!
Please find more information below on hearing dates and proposed changes.