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More on status quo bias in federal sentencing realities

By Douglas A. Berman

The Denver University Law Review last year allowed me to contribute quick thoughts about the Supreme Court's work in Rita v. United States its special speedy issue on Rita.  My contribution, entitled "Rita, Reasoned Sentencing, and Resistance to Change" and available at this link, emphasized the status quo biases we often see in efforts to reform sentencing structures and procedures.  Now I see a new piece here on SSRN developing some similar themes in the wake of Gall and Kimbrough.  This new piece is titled "The More Things Change: A Psychological Case Against Allowing the Federal Sentencing Guidelines to Stay the Same in Light of Gall, Kimbrough, and New Understandings of Reasonableness Review."  Here is the abstract:This Article uses an analysis of the psychology of decision-making to argue that it is time to rethink the proper role of the Sentencing Guidelines...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on July 14, 2008 (boomark / email).