Federal Sentencing Guidelines: Why You Don't Have a Math Problem
Release Date: 04/20/2026
Three Mistakes in Seven Pages of Undisputed Truth
White Collar Advice
Three takeaways from the first seven pages of Mike Tyson's autobiography, Undisputed Truth. One, he wrote that from his character reference letters you would have thought he came up with a cure for cancer, had a plan for peace in the Middle East, and nursed sick kittens back to health. He knew the letters were a lie and said nothing about his character. Two, he wrote that he was so arrogant in the courtroom during the trial that there was no way they were going to give him a break. He knew it was off putting to the judge and he couldn't help it. Three, he told Don King, his former promoter, at...
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At Least Skeletor Tells You He Cheats
White Collar Advice
I read something this morning, then wasted time watching Masters of the Universe, and Skeletor's line at the end took me right back to what I read. Someone home from prison, prosecuted under the Biden DOJ, asked for my thoughts on his indictment. I told him I'm not a lawyer but I would read it. What I read made me sick. The DOJ convicts most people. They have endless resources. Your name versus the United States of America, and people thin slice it, they form a snap judgment, that's a wrap. So why lie? In this indictment a cooperating informant got the executive to say he would help raise...
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Why He Asks for More Time Than the Judge Wants
White Collar Advice
I had dinner with a prosecutor tonight. I wasn't expecting it. I was at my club working on our legal directory, which will have about a hundred lawyers in it soon, and a friend who golfed with him brought him in. Two things stuck with me. He admitted he may ask for a longer sentence when he knows the judge is inclined to give a shorter one, to balance it out. And he talked about the lawyer, and how credible the lawyer is. He studies the defendant, the background, who they are, the offense, how they got into it, whether it was a one-time crime or something that went on a long time, and the...
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The Judge Asked If He'd Ever Earned a Living Lawfully
White Collar Advice
I've attended more than 1,500 sentencing hearings. This one was a guy who graduated college, went straight for an MBA, and built a business raising money to make investments. Three good quarters, then a bad quarter. Instead of telling his investors he lost money, he covered it up and told himself he would make it back. It became a Ponzi scheme, about $7 million, friends and family. I spoke with him 17 months ago and asked what he thought his judge would want to see. He told me he had an MBA, that he got it. I have a degree from USC. So what. That was me at 26, a broker at Bear Stearns thinking...
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Thank You, Have a Great Vacation
White Collar Advice
Someone stopped me at the water park in the Bahamas today while I was with my family. It happens about once a month. He was complimentary about the videos, then said we've got to acknowledge I only served 18 months, that it was nothing. He said it kindly. It took me back to 2008, when I got bad news in prison, started complaining to Michael, then apologized because he was serving a quarter century. Michael told me he was my friend and he was there to listen. He said my 18 months was traumatic for me and I should not compare it to him. So I told the man thank you, have a great vacation. Whether...
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Freedom Doesn't Prove You Changed, Conduct Does
White Collar Advice
Freedom doesn't prove you've changed. Your conduct does. George Santos was sentenced to 78 or 87 months for fraud and identity theft, went to prison, complained, got clemency, came home, and then bet in the prediction markets that he would be somewhere. He made $35,000. He got caught. He settled with a civil agency, and his lawyer proudly said he doesn't admit or deny liability. In 17 years I've watched people go to prison for embezzling $35,000. If you get a pardon or clemency, you should be above reproach. You should set the standard for how to behave. Santos doubled down instead, and he...
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Study Your Judge, Then Mirror Those Values
White Collar Advice
I had an early Zoom call with a doctor indicted in Florida and his lawyer. The doctor couldn't reconcile two things: the FBI agent told him at his arrest that they were in the bottom of the eighth inning, and his lawyer told him to sit back, relax, and wait for discovery. So I brought up Judge Carlos Mendoza, who isn't even his judge. Mendoza enlisted in the Marine Corps out of high school, served in Desert Shield and Desert Storm, came home, went to junior college, college, and law school, and Obama appointed him in 2014. Then I asked the doctor why he became a physician. To help people, he...
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Nobody Can Take This Investment From You
White Collar Advice
I read a quote from Warren Buffett. He wrote that the best investment you'll ever make is in yourself. Learn to communicate on paper and in person. If you can't get your idea across, it's like winking at a girl in the dark. Nothing happens. Get good at it, raise your own value 50%, and nobody can take it from you.
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Mackenzie Shirilla Is Documenting Herself Into a Life Sentence
White Collar Advice
58 pages of conduct reports. Sex toys on a video visit. Stolen earrings from the kindwear room. Fake eyelashes. Mackenzie Shirilla has a 2037 parole hearing. Parole boards don't believe words. They look at records. She is off to a bad start. Justin Paperny
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Federal Sentencing Guidelines: Why You Don't Have a Math Problem
White Collar Advice
Most defendants I speak with think they have a math problem. Loss amount, offense level, criminal history points. They obsess over the guideline range and do nothing to change it. Earlier today I spoke with a defendant back east who has spent weeks on the math and almost no time building the record that actually moves the outcome. This episode is about that mistake. Federal sentencing guidelines give a judge a starting point, not a final answer. I have been to more than 1,500 sentencing hearings since I came home from Taft Federal Prison Camp in 2008. I have heard judges mock defendants who...
info_outlineMost defendants I speak with think they have a math problem. Loss amount, offense level, criminal history points. They obsess over the guideline range and do nothing to change it. Earlier today I spoke with a defendant back east who has spent weeks on the math and almost no time building the record that actually moves the outcome.
This episode is about that mistake.
Federal sentencing guidelines give a judge a starting point, not a final answer. I have been to more than 1,500 sentencing hearings since I came home from Taft Federal Prison Camp in 2008. I have heard judges mock defendants who claimed conduct they could not document. I have watched upper-guideline sentences handed down because a man wrote a letter saying he cared about his family but never once identified with the people he hurt. And I have watched defendants get below-guideline sentences because they sold the second car, moved to a smaller house, sat for a proffer, and kept every record.
In this episode I walk through what judges actually say at sentencing, what the sentencing memorandum cannot do for you, and what thirty to ninety minutes a day between now and your hearing can build that no lawyer can manufacture after the fact.
If you have been charged, are a target of an investigation, or are waiting for someone else to engineer your outcome, this episode is for you. The guidelines are only the guidelines. What you do today is the record.