Will “Libby motions” ever work? Will we be able to tell?

Writing in the San Francisco Chronicle, Bob Egelko has this new article entitled “Double Standard: Bush’s leniency for Libby doesn’t jibe with administration’s push to enforce mandatory minimum sentences.”  The title spotlights the article’s main theme, though the piece ends by noting two cases involving so-called “Libby motions” — i.e., arguments from defense attorneys likening a defendant’s circumstances to Libby’s and quoting Bush’s commutation message when seeking a below-guidelines sentence. 

This article’s discussion of two cases involving Libby motions highlights the challenges that observers and researchers may face when trying to gauge and assess the impact of Bush’s commutation on federal sentencing realities.  I doubt that many (or even any) federal judges will state on the record that that they reducing a defendant’s sentence simply because President Bush reduced Libby’s sentence.  And yet, even if a judge asserts that the President’s sentencing break for Libby is irrelevant to the case at hand, it is certainly possible that the judge has concluded (perhaps subconsciously) that some defendants other than just Libby merit a bit more compassion in the application of federal sentencing rules.