NACDL

VI. The Revocation Hearing and the Options Available

A. The Guidelines

Up to this point everything should be copesetic; at least there should be no undisclosed statutory or guidelines errors, and defense counsel should be ready to appear before the sentencing court for the revocation hearing. What can happen next? In sum, at the revocation hearing the district court can, statutorily, in some cases, simply continue the defendant on supervised release. In the alternative, the court can revoke the term of supervised release and impose a term of imprisonment for as short a period as one day with no supervised release to follow. Also, the court can impose a statutory-maximum term of imprisonment with, in instances where the defendant falls under the PROTECT Act, an additional term of supervised release.¹ In fact, the district court has many options to consider.²  

Pursuant to Chapter Seven of the suggested Guidelines, however, when the district court finds, by a preponderance of evidence,³ t