The Sentencing Commission held a public hearing last Monday on the proposed amendments to the guidelines that were published January 26, 2001. The Commission heard from several government witnesses, including the acting Deputy Attorney General and the Commissioner of Internal Revenue. The Justice Department opposes the proposed amendment to the aggravated-felony enhancement of 2L1.2 (number 18), the proposed money-laundering amendment (number 20), and the sentencing-table amendment (number 14, which would expand zones B and C of the sentencing table).

The bulk of the hearing was devoted to proposed amendment one, which increases the punishment for ecstasy offenses. Several experts testified about the amendment, as did Julie Stewart, president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums, and Ed Mallet, president of NACDL.

Jon Sands, chair of the defenders' sentencing guidelines committee, and A.J. Kramer testified on behalf of the defenders. A.J. addressed two proposed amendments (numbers 17 and 18) dealing with firearms, and Jon addressed the proposed amendment to the aggravated-felony enhancement of 2L1.2 and the proposed amendment to the safety valve provision of 5C1.2 (number 9).

On Tuesday, the Commission voted to promulgate two emergency amendments, to take effect May 1. Ecstasy. The Commission adopted an amendment to the drug equivalency table of 2D1.1 that calls for an equivalency ratio of 1 gram = 500 grams of marijuana. The substances affected are MDA (current ratio of 1 g = 50 g), MDMA (1 g = 35 g), MDEA (1 g = 30 g), and PMA (no ratio currently). List I Chemicals. The Commission adopted the new subsection (d)(1) in proposed amendment 3 and a revised version of the subsection (d)(2) set forth in proposed amendment 3. Revised subsection (d)(2) caps the offense level at 30, instead of 32 (as published). A 50% yield was used to calculate the quantity of meth that a given amount of the substance would produce.