By The United States Sentencing Commission

  More than 780,000 Americans died from a drug overdose in the last ten years. Overdose deaths have increased more than 300 percent from the level two decades ago. The number of such deaths has continued to increase in recent years, with the Centers for Disease Control reporting that 91,799 people died of drug overdoses in 2020, 106,699 in 2021, 107,941 in 2022, and 105,007 in 2023. Provisional data shows a recent decline in overdose deaths beginning in late 2023 and continuing into 2024. Overdoses remain one of the leading causes of deaths in adults in the United States. While fentanyl and fentanyl analogues, methamphetamine, cocaine, and heroin are the drugs most often involved in these deaths, synthetic opioids like fentanyl— which is up to 50 times more potent than heroin—contribute to nearly 70 percent of overdose deaths. In this report, the Commission examines all overdoses identified in drug trafficking cases reported to the Commission for fiscal years 2019 to 2023. One or more deaths occurred in more than three-quarters of these cases, while no deaths occurred in the remaining cases. The Commission is able to collect information about the overdoses reported in these cases through the sentencing documents the courts provide to the Commission in every case.8 Using that information, this report provides an analysis of the 1,340 individuals sentenced for a federal drug trafficking offense involving an overdose in fiscal years 2019 to 2023. In it, the Commission analyzes the demographic characteristics of these individuals, the offense conduct that occurred in the case, and how the courts sentenced these individuals—including the application of sentencing guideline provisions that provide for heightened base offense levels when the offense of conviction established that death or serious bodily injury resulting from an overdose occurred, or departures from the guideline range for death or physical injury, or how often courts varied from the guideline range for a similar reason. Additionally, in this report, the Commission provides the results of a special data collection project to explore the outcome of each overdose, the type of drug involved in the overdose, the victim’s knowledge of the drug they were taking, and the sentenced individual’s conduct during the offense.  

Washington, DC, USSC, 2025.   52p.

By Kristin M. Tennyson, Lindsey Jeralds, Julie Zibulsky

Congress requires courts to consider several factors when determining the appropriate sentence to be imposed in federal cases, among them the “history and characteristics of the defendant.” The sentencing guidelines also specifically authorize judges to consider an offender’s age when determining whether to depart from the federal sentencing guidelines. In this report, the Commission presents information on a relatively small number of offenders who were aged 50 or older at the time they were sentenced in the federal system. In particular, the report examines older federal offenders who were sentenced in fiscal year 2021 and the crimes they committed, then assesses whether age was given a special consideration at sentencing. This report specifically focuses on three issues that could impact the sentencing of older offenders: age and infirmity, life expectancy, and the risk of recidivism.

Washington, DC: United States Sentencing Commission, 2022. 68p.

By Tracey Kyckelhahn, Tiffany Choi

This study expands on prior Commission research by examining the geographic mobility of federal offenders. For this report, mobility is defined as having convictions in multiple states, including the location of the conviction for the instant offense. This report adds to the existing literature on offender criminal history in two important ways. First, the report provides information on how mobile federal offenders are, as measured by the number of offenders with convictions in multiple states. Second, the report provides information on the proportion of offenders with convictions in states other than the state in which the offender was convicted for the instant offense. The report also examines the degree to which out-of-state convictions in offenders’ criminal histories contributed to their criminal history score and their Criminal History Category.

Washington, DC: United States Sentencing Commission, 2020.  24p.

By Kristen M. Budd 

Report examines misconceptions around crimes of a sexual nature that contribute to the rise in imprisonment rates and the lengthening of sentences, and offers recommendations for reform.  

Washington DC: The Sentencing Project, 2024. 14p.