Several House members on Thursday introduced legislation to apply new crack cocaine sentencing guidelines to inmates already in prison and defendants who have pending cases.
The bill offered by Reps. Robert Scott (D-Va.), Ron Paul (R-Texas), John Conyers (D-Mich.), Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.), Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.) and Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) would retroactively apply the more lenient sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine offenses that are in the 2010 Fair Sentencing Act. The act brought down the sentencing disparities between crack and powder cocaine offenses in an attempt to fix what many considered to be an unjust discrepancy between sentences involving crack cocaine, more usually involving black offenders, and powder cocaine, often involving white offenders.
“There is absolutely no reason that individuals sentenced under the old crack cocaine laws should not receive the benefit of the FSA,” Scott said in a statement. “Congress has acknowledged that the 100-to-1 disparity was fundamentally unfair and had a racially disparate impact. People sentenced under the old law should not be required to serve out sentences imposed as a result of what Congress has now recognized to be an unjust law.”
Attorney General Eric Holder earlier this month urged the U.S. Sentencing Commission to retroactively apply the new sentencing instructions. But a retroactive application of the guidelines has garnered stiff opposition.
Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, on Thursday threatened to take legislative action in an effort to ensure the 2010 Fair Sentencing Act is applied prospectively. He said in remarks prepared for a Senate Judiciary Committee meeting that retroactive application would pose “a major threat to public safety.”
“Most of these offenders are violent and likely to reoffend,” Grassley said. “Although these offenders are now serving time for crack cocaine offenses, the vast majority have been convicted of serious crimes in the past.”
The National Association of Assistant United States Attorneys, the leading organization of federal prosecutors, also has pushed against retroactively applying the sentencing instructions. NAAUSA President Steven H. Cook wrote in a letter earlier this month to Judge Patti B. Saris, the U.S. Sentencing Commission chairman, that retroactive application would cause “immeasurable crime impact” and “erode the confidence of the law enforcement community.”
