Policy for Longer, Uniform Prison Terms Issued

The U.S. Sentencing Commission issued guidelines Monday to increase prison terms for many federal crimes and to force judges to sentence people convicted of such offenses according to a uniform set of regulations.

The guidelines are designed to wipe out wide disparities in penalties for similar offenses.

“We want to take the two extremities of our justice system, the hanging judge and the Baby Ruth judge, and pull them in together,” commission Chairman William Wilkins, a federal appeals court judge, told a news conference. Because of “unwarranted disparity” in sentencing, he said, “fairness is sometimes lacking.”

The guidelines also are expected to cause a 10% increase in the federal prison population over the next decade, the commission said. That population is now 42,000, a 75% jump since 1980.

The guidelines, which will take effect on an experimental basis late this year, will increase prison terms for robbery, fraud, forgery, drug violations and a host of other crimes.

Abolition of Parole

The impact of the guidelines will be even more significant when combined with other measures--such as abolition of parole and reduction of time off for good behavior--required by the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984.

In addition, new federal laws now taking effect target drug dealers and repeat offenders with a background of violent crime for longer prison terms.

The commission approved the new sentencing system on a 6-1 vote over the weekend, and it now will be reviewed by Congress before taking effect.

Commissioner Paul H. Robinson, a Rutgers University professor, dissented, saying that “the guidelines treat identically offenses that are of very different seriousness. . . . The commission has chosen . . . to mimic the mathematical averages of past sentences.”

Bank robbers would have another three months added to their terms by the guidelines; two months would be added for fraud and forgery, and eight months would be added to the terms of heroin dealers. Bank robbers now serve an average of 44 months; those convicted of fraud and forgery serve slightly less than seven months, and heroin dealers serve 29 months.

Increased Crowding Feared

Congressional and other critics predict that the commission’s approach to sentencing will overwhelm already-overcrowded prisons.

Although Wilkins has acknowledged that the guidelines will cause some rise in the prison population, he insists that it will not be significant.

He has said that allowing the number of available prison beds to determine sentencing practices “is a dangerous case of the tail wagging the dog that ignores the goals of public protection, crime deterrence and appropriate punishment of offenders.”

Norman Carlson, director of the federal prison system, said he does not question the sentence lengths proposed by the guidelines but is “concerned with our ability to respond.”

Judges who depart from the guidelines have to cite aggravating or mitigating factors in writing, and both the defendant and the prosecutor could appeal.