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68 Fordham L. Rev. 1245 (1999-2000)
Above the Law: The Prosecutor's Duty to Seek Justice and the Performance of Substantial Assistance Agreements

handle is hein.journals/flr68 and id is 1261 raw text is: NOTES ABOVE THE LAW: THE PROSECUTOR'S DUTY TO SEEK JUSTICE AND THE PERFORMANCE OF SUBSTANTIAL ASSISTANCE AGREEMENTS Ross Galin* The qualities of a good prosecutor are as elusive and as impossible to define as those which mark a gentleman. And those who need to be told would not understand it anyway. A sensitiveness to fair play and sportsmanship is perhaps the best protection against the abuse of power, and the citizen's safety lies in the prosecutor who tempers zeal with human kindness, who seeks truth and not victims, who serves the law and not factional purposes, and who approaches his task with humility. Robert H. Jackson' INTRODUCTION In 1987 the United States Sentencing Commission fulfilled the purpose for which Congress created it by enacting the Federal Sentencing Guidelines (guidelines).2 Intended to create uniform sentences, the guidelines established a clear and rigid sentencing structure with narrow ranges within which federal judges must sentence the guilty.' A judge can grant a federal criminal defendant a sentence below the prescribed range only if the government- ordinarily the prosecutor-makes a formal section 5Kl.1 (5K) motion to the court requesting a downward departure based on substantial assistance 5K motions are an important tool used by prosecutors to induce and reward both guilty pleas and cooperation * J.D. Candidate, 2001, Fordham University School of Law. I would like to thank Professor Bruce A. Green for his guidance and insight, my family for their support, and my wife, Camille, for her love, encouragement, and patience. 1. Robert H. Jackson, The Federal Prosecutor (Address Delivered at the Second Annual Conference of United States Attorneys, Apr. 1. 1940), reprinted in 31 J. Am. Inst. L. & Criminology 3, 6 (1940). 2. See infra Part I.A. 3. See infra Part I.A. 4. See infra Part I.B. 1245

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