Federal Sentencing Assistance

The Justice Advocacy Group LLC has 30 plus years of experience preparing clients for sentencing in U.S. District Court. We work with criminal defense lawyers researching and investigating non-custodial sentencing options, sentencing mitigation and other ways to lessen the impact of incarceration on clients.

We are intimately familiar with the United States Sentencing Guidelines and post US v. Booker, have been fashioning persuasive arguments under 18 U.S.C. §3553(a) to justify the issuance of a non-guideline sentence.

Federal sentencing cases typically include the following tasks:

• Prepare a comprehensive report on client’s personal, professional and/or business background, and any significant mitigation (including family, health, cultural, offense-related) circumstances that may be relevant for sentencing.  This report would be incorporated into the client’s defense sentencing memorandum.

• Review and offer commentary on defense sentencing strategy and through consultations with client and counsel, identify factors present in the case that could support an argument for a non-custodial sentence or sentence variance below the client’s guideline range. Our goal in each case is to obtain the least restrictive sentence possible consistent with public safety.

• Review and comment on the character letters to be used to supplement a client’s sentencing memorandum. We can fully coordinate the effort to obtain these letters.

• Assist with sentencing guideline research or analysis necessary in reference to the Probation Office’s determination of client’s guideline range.

• If needed, prepare a preliminary memorandum for the Probation Office offering our analysis of the mitigation present in a client’s case and subsequently help prepare the technical response to the draft Pre-sentence Report (PSR).

• If practical, design and implement a community-based sentencing alternative including the preparation of materials for the court, outlining a specific sentencing proposal with supporting documentation.

For federal sentencing assistance contact Joel Sickler and the Justice Advocacy Group today.