Overview of Federal Criminal Cases, Fiscal Year 2011

Summary

FY 2011 Overview of Federal Criminal CasesThe United States Sentencing Commission received information on 86,361 federal criminal cases in which the offender was sentenced in fiscal year 2011. Among these cases, 86,201 involved an individual offender and 160 involved a corporation or “organizational” offender. This publication provides a brief overview of those cases.

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Key Findings

A review of cases reported to the Commission in fiscal year 2011 reveal the following:

  • The vast majority of the cases reported to the Commission involve an individual defendant. Over the last decade, the number of these cases has increased every year except one. In fiscal year 2011, the increase was 2.7 percent over the number of such cases in fiscal year 2010.

  • Immigration cases continued to be the fastest growing segment of cases in the federal system. In fiscal year 2011, there were 29,717 immigration cases reported to the Commission, an increase of 1,213 cases from the prior fiscal year.

  • In the last ten fiscal years, the number of immigration cases has increased by 153.2 percent, while the total federal caseload has grown by 33.9 percent.

  • In fiscal year 2011, 52.0 percent of all offenders were United States citizens. However, the percentage of non-citizen offenders has risen substantially over the last ten years, up 10.6 percentage points from fiscal year 2007, and up 14.4 percentage points from fiscal year 2002.

  • In fiscal year 2011, 72.7 percent of offenders received a sentence of less than five years, 15.5 percent of offenders received a sentence of five or more years but less than ten years, and 11.8 percent received a sentence of ten or more years, excluding life imprisonment.

  • Virtually all offenders who were sentenced to imprisonment also were sentenced to serve a period of supervised release following the completion of their confinement. In fiscal year 2011, 92.4 percent of offenders sentenced to incarceration also were sentenced to serve a period of supervised release.


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