Justices Asked to Settle Sentencing Chaos

U.S. Solicitor General Charles Fried asked the Supreme Court on Thursday to intervene to resolve a dispute over whether a panel of judges and academic experts may impose mandatory sentencing rules on the federal courts.

The issue has become so contentious that Fried has requested an expedited review, a process that has been used only in such constitutional crises as President Richard M. Nixon’s refusal to turn over the Watergate tapes and President Harry S. Truman’s seizure of strike-threatened steel mills during the Korean War.

Uniformity Sought

The new sentencing rules, which went into effect in November, were intended to bring stability and uniformity to the courts, ensuring that convicted criminals would get the same sentence for the same crime. Instead, judges and lawyers say, the result has been chaotic.

So far, 74 judges have declared the new rules to be unconstitutional on grounds that the judges on the U.S. Sentencing Commission had no authority to impose binding rules on other judges. In those courts, criminals continue to be sentenced under old rules, while 47 other judges have adhered to the new system.

The dispute has caused disarray even within individual courts. In San Diego, for example, a judge in one federal district courtroom may be using the new rules to impose stiff sentences, but a judge in the next court may follow his own, more lenient sentencing standards.

L.A. Courts Reject Rules

In Los Angeles federal courts, the judges voted down the new rules and are sentencing criminals under the previous system.

“This widespread and entrenched division has created intolerable uncertainty about the sentencing process,” Fried told the justices in a brief filed late Thursday. “Unless this court promptly settles the dispute, the federal criminal justice system not only will suffer from this uncertainty but also will face the prospect of having to re-sentence thousands of defendants who have been sentenced during the interim.”

About 40,000 people are convicted of federal crimes each year. If half of those people are sentenced under the new system this year and half are sentenced under the old system, federal judges will face a staggering burden of re-sentencing hearings, regardless of what the high court decides.

No Decision Soon

Even if the justices heed Fried’s plea for an expedited review, the issue cannot be resolved before the end of this year, Justice Department officials said.

The high court finished hearing cases for this term in late April and will issue rulings through early July. The justices could schedule arguments in the sentencing dispute in early October, but a ruling could not be expected for at least two months after that.

Normally, the justices would not have taken up the sentencing issue until a ruling by a state supreme court or one of the 13 federal appellate courts was brought up on appeal.

As the chaos over the sentencing dispute has spread to courts across the nation, the Justice Department had little choice but to move for a quick resolution. But the controversy has arisen at an awkward time for the Reagan Administration.

Department officials have urged the Supreme Court in a pending case to strike down the law that provides for independent counsels on the grounds that federal judges have no constitutional authority to appoint prosecutors.

Separation Doctrine Cited

When Congress gave this power to a three-judge panel under the 1978 Ethics in Government Act, the officials said, it violated the separation of powers doctrine of the Constitution. Only executive branch officials such as the attorney general may appoint prosecutors, they contend.

However, in the sentencing case, Justice Department lawyers argue that “an independent commission” that includes three judges does not violate the separation-of-powers doctrine. They contend that the judges were actually serving as executive branch officials when they were drawing up the sentencing rules.