,
7 tweets,
2 min read
Read on Twitter
Manafort's sentence is an example of a broader problem: white collar crimes (e.g. fraud, money laundering) just aren't taken seriously. Here are some other examples:
In one extreme case from last May, a banker who facilitated a multibillion-dollar laundering scheme received a 32-month sentence. Federal prosecutors argued for 20 years and the sentencing guidelines called for 105 years: justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/t…, nysd.uscourts.gov/cases/show.php…
A survey of 240 state and federal judges in 216 showed that 3 out of 4 judges would choose the minimum sentence available when presented with a hypothetical sentencing report for a fraud conviction carrying a 151- to 235-month sentence. ilr.law.uiowa.edu/print/volume-1…
A 2003 survey of felony sentences in Florida courts found that white-collar offenders were 33.4% more likely than "street criminals" convicted of property crimes (e.g. theft) to avoid incarceration entirely. citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/downlo…
Countless other studies since the '70s show this same pattern, and it's maddening.
Sure, the Guidelines formula may need to be tweaked. But this class of crimes can have hundreds or even thousands of direct victims in a given case, often from vulnerable populations such as elderly pensioners or working class people fleeced of their savings.
Other cases can have broader reverberations by spreading perceptions of a "rigged system" where the unscrupulous are unaccountable and the law-abiding are chumps. Cynicism spreads, ethics erode, and society radicalizes slowly but surely as a result.
