Morning sentencing stories

Here are just a few of the many sentencing items in the morning papers:

• This article in the Houston Chronicle discussing yesterday’s sentencings of two Enron Nigerian barge defendants (discussed here and here) suggests that, because the defendants received “far less than the government requested Thursday, [the result gave] white-collar criminal defense attorneys hope the sentences herald a better day for their clients.”

• This article from North Dakota discusses the Eighth Circuit’s decision yesterday in a major fraud case (discussed in this post).

• This commentary from Wisconsin about a federal sentencing has the compelling title of “Polite bandit gets a polite sentence.”

• This article from Pennsylvania reports on a federal sentence in which the defendant received “more than three years in prison for selling mail-order videotapes of fighting pit bulls.”