On Tuesday, the Second Circuit affirmed the 42-month prison sentence of former Impath Inc. COO Richard Adelson, despite an 85-year sentence recommended by the federal sentencing guidelines. Federal prosecutors had appealed to the Second Circuit seeking more time for Adelson.
In Adelson’s case, a sentencing calculation based on stock-price loss produced a potential 85-year term for securities fraud. U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff called that a virtual life sentence and “patently unreasonable,” of the sort reserved for Mafia dons and drug kingpins, according to the National Law Journal.
The Second Circuit rejected the government’s argument that Judge Rakoff “discarded the guidelines in favor of the district court’s personal view of the seriousness of the offense.” It held that the lower court “carefully considered” and relied on sentencing factors in fashioning the term for Adelson.
