By John Leschak
Federal judge John Gleeson on the Eastern District of N.Y., gave a lecture at the Law School on Feb. 13 about the challenges in federal courts following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in U.S. v. Booker, in which the Court ruled that sentencing guidelines are no longer mandatory.
Gleeson was also a U.S. attorney in the Eastern District and was the head of the organized crime unit that prosecuted mobster John Gotti twice.
“The guidelines restricted discretion, they did not touch plea bargaining,” Gleeson said. He spoke about the mandatory sentencing guidelines that were in place for federal judges since the passage of the Sentencing Reform Act in 1984.
Plea bargaining refers to the power of prosecutors to enter into an agreement with a defendant where the defendant agrees to plead guilty for a lesser sentence.
In 1989, the Federal Sentencing Commission passed Amendment 295 to the Reform Act, which required judges to reject a plea bargain if it was not one of several “justifiable reasons” specifically defined by the amendment. Gleeson said this amendment made sentencing disparities resulting from prosecutable discretions subject to the same limits as those on judge’s discretion.
Gleeson claimed this limit on prosecutable discretion is “the most important defect in the guidelines.” Although the Booker case rendered the guidelines merely advisory, it gave judges the power to accept plea bargains.
However, most courts still follow Amendment 295, he said.
The Supreme Court must do more than rule that the guidelines are not mandatory, Gleeson said. “The court should positively state that plea bargains are good, and revoke 295,” he said.
Gleeson supports plea bargains because he believes that a shorter sentence may be in public interest if it will ensure conviction of criminals such as Gotti.
He also considered some arguments against plea bargains, in particular, prosecutors who routinely lie about evidence before them and coerce innocent people to plead guilty. Monroe Freedman, a professor of legal ethics, raised that possibility by referencing the controversy created by former Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez when he fired prosecutors for political reasons.
Gleeson believed that prosecutors were politically liable and could be fired for misconduct.