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How do you prepare for a federal sentencing hearing?
Most of the work happens before the hearing. Former StarKist executive Steve Hodge waited three and a half years after his May 30, 2017 price-fixing plea, then told Judge Edward M. Chen about his crime, his remorse, and his plans, and blamed no one. He received probation.
Facts | |
|---|---|
Charge | Price fixing |
Court | Northern District of California; Judge Edward M. Chen |
FBI contact | August 2015 |
Plea | May 30, 2017 |
Cooperation | Testified at the Christopher Lischewski trial |
Sentence | Probation |
At some point in your hearing, the judge will look at you and ask if there is anything you would like to say. Everyone in the courtroom will turn. Your lawyer will sit down. It will be you, a microphone, and the judge.
Steve Hodge stood in that spot in Judge Edward M. Chen's courtroom in the Northern District of California. When he finished, Judge Chen said on the record that he believed him.
How Steve got there started with two phone numbers.
Two phone numbers
Steve was Senior Vice President of Sales at StarKist. He managed accounts with Walmart, Kroger, and every major grocery chain in the country, and he was good at it.
Then a colleague handed him two phone numbers and said: "Now that Chuck and I are gone, this is your responsibility." The numbers belonged to competitors at Chicken of the Sea and Bumble Bee. Steve made the calls. He talked prices with people he had no business talking prices with. He knew it was wrong before he knew it was illegal, and by the time he understood all of it, he didn't stop.
The interview he got wrong
The FBI showed up in August 2015. Steve did not handle that first interview well. He was not fully truthful.
He hired a lawyer immediately afterward and told the truth from that point forward. He testified in the trial of Christopher Lischewski, and his cooperation helped the government secure guilty pleas from StarKist and Bumble Bee. He pleaded guilty himself on May 30, 2017.
If your first conversation with agents went badly, Steve's case is worth reading twice. A bad start is part of your record. So is everything you do after it. Get a lawyer before you say another word, and let what follows be true.
The salon
Steve waited three and a half years between his plea and his sentencing. With his wife, Athena, he bought a hair salon. He learned an industry he knew nothing about, trained the staff, and set it up to run without him. He consulted for McCall Farms. He read everything I published, and then he hired our team.
What the judge read before Steve stood up
By the time you speak at your hearing, the judge has already read your file. The hearing is where the sentence is announced. The preparation happened months before.
Steve's narrative gave Judge Chen a life. Hamilton, New York, population 2,500. His mother's death from lymph node cancer in 1987, at 59. His father, the village attorney for 40 years, arrested for fraud in 1983 and never sent to prison because of his age and service. The Greek Orthodox church. Thirty-eight years in the grocery business. Children who finished college in four years, straight out of high school, because Steve insisted and meant it.
Then it named the offense the way he had lived it: the colleague, the two numbers, the calls, the prices, the moment he knew and kept going.
His character letters came from family, colleagues, and friends. The instruction I gave him, which he repeated in his review, was just enough, but not too many. A few people who knew him, each writing about what they had seen.
What he said, and what he left out
When Judge Chen asked, Steve talked about three things: his crime, his remorse, and what he intended to do.
He left three things out. He did not blame the colleague who handed him the phone numbers. He did not blame StarKist. He did not point out that other people were never charged.
All three were true. All three would have sounded like excuses. A judge who hears a defendant reach for someone else's name stops listening to the rest.
Judge Chen sentenced Steve to probation.
What happens on the day
Most federal sentencing hearings follow a similar order. The judge confirms you have read the presentence report with your lawyer and resolves any objections. The court settles on the advisory guideline range. The prosecutor and your defense attorney each argue for a sentence. Victims may speak. Then the judge asks whether you want to address the court. After that, the sentence is announced, along with any surrender date or other conditions.
Arrive early. Dress the way you would for the most important job interview of your life. Ask your lawyer who from your family should be in the courtroom, where they should sit, and whether you might be taken into custody that day so they are ready.
Take out a sheet of paper and write down every person or circumstance you are tempted to mention at your hearing: the boss, the company, the people who weren't charged, the bad advice. Read the list once. Then cross out every line. What's left is what you say. Bring that page to a $500 diagnostic call with me, and we'll build your statement from it.
Thank you,
Justin Paperny
Written by
Justin Paperny
Founder White Collar Advice