On October 1, 2015, a bipartisan group of U.S. senators introduced the Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act of 2015 (S. 2123). The legislation is sponsored by Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA), Dick Durbin (D-IL), John Cornyn (R-TX), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Mike Lee (R-UT), Charles Schumer (D-NY), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), and Cory Booker (D-NJ). The goal of the legislation is to reduce overcrowding in U.S. prisons. The key provisions in the bill include the following: 1. Reduces the enhanced penalties that apply to repeat drug offenders and eliminates the three-strike mandatory life provision, but allows enhanced penalties to be applied to offenders with prior convictions for serious violent felonies and serious drug felonies. 2. Expands the existing safety valve to offenders with extensive criminal histories, but excludes defendants with prior felonies and violent or drug trafficking offenses unless a court finds those prior offenses substantially overstate the defendant's criminal history and danger of recidivism. 3. Raises the statutory maximum for unlawful possession of firearms, but lowers the enhanced mandatory minimum for repeat offenders. 4. Creates a second safety valve that gives judges the discretion to sentence certain low-level offenders to sentences less than the 10-year mandatory minimum. 5. Creates new mandatory minimum sentences for certain crimes involving interstate domestic violence and creates a new mandatory minimum for providing weapons and other defense materials to prohibited countries and terrorists. 6. Limits solitary confinement for juveniles in federal custody.
展开▼
