Legal Commentary

Judge to Issue New Sentence for Qwest's Joe Nacchio

By Jeralyn

At 2:00 pm, the court will issue its new sentence for former Qwest CEO Joe Nacchio.

The Denver Post reports the Judge today said she accepted the Government's version of the amount of loss and is putting it at 28 to 32 million, which means his guidelines would be the same, 63 to 78 months. His original sentence was 72 months.

So, the question is, will the Judge agree to a downward departure from the guidelines or a variance from a guideline sentence under the factors in 18 USC 3553(a)?

I thought the defense wrote an excellent sentencing statement, but I wouldn't even try to predict how the Judge will rule.

I'll be offline when the sentence comes down and will update later this afternoon. In the meantime, read about Joe's hellish 34 day trip from court in Denver back to the prison camp in NY -- which included long bouts in special housing units in Oklahoma and several days at MDC Brooklyn. Lots of solitary and lots of shackles, I may post the pleadings later.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on June 24, 2010 (boomark / email).