[zajio1am]

> What actually happens in sentencing is that you look up the relevant sentencing guidelines in the (public, easily downloaded) federal sentencing guidelines

Well, it is called 'guidelines' and your post uses words like 'suggesting'. So if relevant people went crazy and just decide to ignore these guidelines and choose, say, 20 years, would such decision be legal?

[tptacek]

It would be unprecedented and appealable, but mostly it just wouldn't happen. Judges aren't required to adhere to the guidelines (anymore), but they overwhelmingly do --- presumably, not least because the primary input to the sentencing process is a PSR that is derived directly from the guidelines.

Note here that to reach 20 years, you have to do more than disagree with the guideline offense levels; you have to somehow disagree with the grouping rules. 20 years wasn't on the table to begin with (again: the prosecutors threatened a much lower sentence), but it couldn't seriously have been put on the table either.