These definitions follow the U.S. Sentencing Commission individual-offender codebook and the project dataset notes. They are not legal advice.
Advisory guidelines. Since United States v. Booker (2005), the federal sentencing guidelines are advisory. The judge calculates the range and may sentence above or below it with reasons.
Amendment 821. A 2023 guideline amendment. It added the zero-point offender reduction and changed status points. It took effect November 1, 2023.
CIRCDIST. Circuit and district code in Sourcebook order, 1 through 94. Not the same numbering as DISTRICT.
DISTRICT. District code in numeric order, 0 through 96. The current state pages roll this code up to a state. A district page needs its own export.
Fiscal year. October 1 through September 30. Fiscal year 2025 is October 1, 2024 through September 30, 2025.
Life sentence, in this file. SENTTCAP exactly 470. Counted separately. Not included in a median or a mean.
PRISDUM. 1 if the defendant received a prison sentence. Prison-length figures use this filter before they use SENTTCAP.
SENTTCAP. Capped prison length in months. The Commission's preferred prison-length field from fiscal year 2018 on. Life is 470. A non-life sentence at the cap is 469.99.
SENTRNGE. Whether the sentence was within, above, or below the guideline range, and which mechanism produced the difference. Government-sponsored departures, including §5K1.1, are not the same category as a judge-initiated below-range sentence.
Status points. Criminal-history points added when the offense was committed under a criminal-justice sentence. The rule changed at guideline year 2023. Do not treat a pooled status-point figure as a before-and-after comparison.
§5K1.1. A government motion for a lower sentence based on substantial assistance in another case. It is not a judge-initiated departure.
Variance. A sentence outside the guideline range under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a), after Booker. It is not the same mechanism as a traditional departure.
ZEROPNT. Whether the zero-point offender reduction was applied. Present from fiscal year 2024 on. Not shown for earlier years.
Zero-point offender. A defendant with no criminal-history points who meets the §4C1.1 criteria and receives a two-level reduction. That reduction is Amendment 821.