Answer to Question 1
B
Answer to Question 2
Both sentencing guidelines and mandatory minimum sentences have three aims.
(1) Uniformity is served, which is the notion that similar crimes should receive similar punishment.
(2) Certainty and truth in sentencing, or the notion that convicted offenders, victims, and the public should know that the sentence imposed is similar to the sentence actually to be served.
(3) Guidelines and mandatory sentences promote retribution, deterrence, and incapacitation, where the rehabilitation of individual offenders is no longer the primary aim of punishment.
Mandatory minimum sentences require judges to impose a nondiscretionary minimum amount of prison time that all offenders convicted of the offense have to serve. Judges can sentence offenders to more than the minimum, but not less.
With sentencing guidelines, a commission establishes a relatively narrow range of penalties, and judges are supposed to choose a specific sentence within that range. The guidelines depend on a combination of the seriousness of the crime and the offender's criminal history. Sentences are either presumptively incarceration or presumptively probation. Judges can depart from the ranges set in the guidelines but have to give written reasons for doing so. Additionally, certain reasons for departure are no longer allowed.
