Administering Blakely

I will likely be off-line the rest of Tuesday as I travel to Atlanta to speak about Blakely at the “2004 National Conference for District Court Clerks, District Court Executives, and Chief Deputy Clerks.” This should be an interesting event because the clerks do not have a partisan stake in the substance of Blakely and Booker /Fanfan, but they have a direct concern with the administration of federal sentencing.

In a pre-event conference call, I heard that issues of concern for the clerks were (1) whether Blakely et al. would lead to an upsurge in the number of criminal jury trials (and the accompanying administrative challenges and costs of conducting such trials), and (2) whether and how Blakely et al. retroactivity claims would be handled and could be processed. I have a few thoughts on these matters to share, and I am looking forward to hearing the clerks’ perspectives on these issues.

I hope to be back on-line by late Tuesday night, but posting may not resume until Wednesday. Of course, I posted a lot of interest before leaving, and I also encourage those needing to feed their Blakely addiction to be sure to review (and send me comments on) my “Conceptualizing Blakely” article available here.

Also, my Blakely Basics page has been updated to include October blog posts of note.