Dear friend,

Imagine you are charged with two crimes. You go to trial and the jury finds you guilty of one, but not the other.

Now, imagine at sentencing that the judge imposes a sentence for both crimes. You will serve time not only for the conduct for which the jury convicted you, but also for the acquitted conduct.

Not in our criminal justice system, you say.

But you'd be wrong.

In our criminal justice system, judges are directed to calculate the prison sentence using even acquitted conduct. FAMM has fought against the use of acquitted conduct for years, and has repeatedly urged the United States Sentencing Commission to end its use.

Using acquitted conduct at sentencing undermines citizens' view of our justice system as fair and balanced. FAMM members tell us they cannot understand why our sentencing rules direct judges to count conduct that a jury has examined and rejected — and we ourselves find it hard to explain.

Now, we are taking the fight to the U.S. Supreme Court. FAMM has filed an amicus brief in a case, Asaro v. United States, asking the court to review and then end the practice once and for all.

We asked our members in prison to tell us their stories that we could use in our brief, and we heard from many people. We included some of their experiences in our brief, which you can read here: https://famm.org/wp-content/uploads/asaro-amicus-brief-famm.pdf

We will keep you posted on this effort and all our work in the courts to bring justice to our system.


Mary Price
General Counsel, FAMM