At the time of Martha's offense, the guideline level for obstruction of justice under USSG 2J1.2 was 12. That's the guideline that will be used because it is the highest of the offenses for which she was convicted. If "grouping" doesn't raise it, and the Judge doesn't impose other enhancements or upward adjustments, she will stay in Zone C, which could mean a split sentence: at least half of the minimum must be served in jail, and the other half can be served on home detention or in a halfway house.

In other words, if Martha comes out at level 12 in Zone C, the Judge has the option of sentencing her to between 10 and 16 months. If she chooses the lower end, 10 months, she can order that five months be served in jail and five be served on house arrest.

If the applicable guideline range is in Zone C of the Sentencing Table, the minimum term may be satisfied by --

(1) a sentence of imprisonment; or

(2) a sentence of imprisonment that includes a term of supervised release with a condition that substitutes community confinement or home detention according to the schedule in subsection (e), provided that at least one-half of the minimum term is satisfied by imprisonment.

But....if any enhancements or adjustments increase Martha's guidelines over level 12, all of her sentence will have to be served in a federal prison camp. For example, if her final guideline level is 13, the judge would have to sentence her to between 12 and 18 months. Then the Judge could really stick it to Martha if she wanted by sentencing her to 12 months instead of 12 months and a day.

On federal sentences of 12 months or less, there is no good time, Martha would have to serve the whole thing. If the sentence is 12 months and a day, Martha would get 54 days of good time off the sentence and only do about 10 months. Of course, the Judge could sentence her to the upper end of the guidelines, 18 months, and then she'd have to serve 85% of that.

As for a downward departure, we don't forsee one, but we agree with the article that the most likely one would be aberrant conduct--a single act of wrongdoing or a single criminal transaction in an otherwise unblemished life.

The court may depart downward under this policy statement only if the defendant committed a single criminal occurrence or single criminal transaction that (1) was committed without significant planning; (2) was of limited duration; and (3) represents a marked deviation by the defendant from an otherwise law-abiding life.

This departure is rarely granted. Because Martha was convicted of lying over a course of months and of conspiring with Bacanovic, we don't think she will get this. If she does, however, the Judge could depart downward to straight probation.

Grouping is the other factor to consider. If Martha's false statements and obstruction are considered to be "closely related counts", her guideline range would likely remain that of the highest offense, the obstruction. But, the guidelines don't include obstruction of justice as either a closely related or non-closely related count. And for such offenses, the guideline manual says:

For multiple counts of offenses that are not listed, grouping under this subsection may or may not be appropriate; a case-by-case determination must be made based upon the facts of the case and the applicable guidelines (including specific offense characteristics and other adjustments) used to determine the offense level.

So, again, this may be up to the Judge. Finally, there is also the possiblility, although we think it remote, that the Judge will increase her level for the obstruction of justice by three levels due to this provision:

2) If the offense resulted in substantial interference with the administration of justice, increase by 3 levels.

That would put Martha at a level 15 with a guideline range of 18 to 24 months.

We're sure Martha's lawyers will retain the services of the best sentencing guideline experts out there--but in the end, it will come down to what the Probation Department recommends to the Judge and what the Judge decides Martha's guidelines are. It's not a simple calculation.