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# §2B3.1 Robbery: Federal Sentences, Fiscal Year 2024
- URL: https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal-guideline-2b3-1-robbery-fy2024/
- Published: 2026-11-04T10:23:45.000Z
- Updated: 2026-11-04T10:23:45.000Z
- Description: In fiscal year 2024, 1,305 people were sentenced in federal court with §2B3.1 ("Robbery") as the primary guideline. The median prison term was 96 months (8 years), and 94% pleaded guilty. The median for all federal cases that year was 30 months.
- Author: Jocelyn C. Stewart
- Tags: Understanding Trends, Federal

[Trends](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/) › [Federal Prosecution Analysis](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal/) › [§2B3.1 Robbery](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal-guideline-2b3-1-robbery/) › §2B3.1: FY2024

**In brief:** In fiscal year 2024, 1,305 people were sentenced in federal court with §2B3.1 ("Robbery") as the primary guideline. The median prison term was 96 months (8 years), and 94% pleaded guilty. The median for all federal cases that year was 30 months.

Updated November 4, 2026 · Sources: U.S. Sentencing Commission and Federal Judicial Center, fiscal years 2016–2025

This post uses the U.S. Sentencing Commission's records of 1,305 people sentenced in federal court in fiscal year 2024\. Acquittals and dismissals come from a second source, the Federal Judicial Center's records of 753,808 federal defendants whose cases ended in fiscal years 2016 to 2025\. It is part of the [Federal Prosecution Analysis](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal/) series, which builds on [Military Moves Toward Sentencing Guidelines to Mirror the Federal System](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/military-sentencing-guidelines-federal-system/). How the numbers were built: [How the Federal Comparison Data Was Built](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal-data-methodology/).

## What Prison Terms Did Federal Robbery Cases Carry in Fiscal Year 2024?

Of the 1,305 people sentenced under §2B3.1, 1,296 received a prison term. Another 9 received probation only, with no prison or other confinement. 1 person received a life sentence.

Among those sent to prison, the median prison term was 96 months. A quarter received 144 months or more, and a quarter received 57 months or less. These are the terms imposed, not the time actually served.

For all people sentenced in federal court in fiscal year 2024, under every guideline, the median prison term was 30 months. The 61,678 people in that group include many offense types, so the comparison shows how robbery cases differ in size of sentence and says nothing more than that.

## Guilty Pleas Compared With Trials

1,229 of the 1,305 people (94%) pleaded guilty. The other 76 were convicted after a trial. Across all guidelines in fiscal year 2024, 97% pleaded guilty, so a guilty plea was somewhat less common here than in federal court overall.

The median prison term after a guilty plea was 92 months. After a trial it was 188 months, based on 76 people convicted at trial and sent to prison. Among those who pleaded guilty, 88% had a written plea agreement and 12% were straight pleas with no agreement.

The medians for pleas and for trials describe different groups of cases. The records do not show how strong the evidence was in each case or what plea offers were made, so they cannot explain the gap between them.

## Mandatory Minimums and the Guideline Range

A mandatory minimum prison term applied to 532 of the 1,305 people with that information recorded (41%).

The sentencing guidelines produce a recommended range for each case. Of the 1,304 people with the information recorded, 40% (519) were sentenced within the range. Another 25% (331) were sentenced below the range at the government's request, and 28% (364) were sentenced below it without a government request. 7% (90) were sentenced above the range.

For all federal cases in fiscal year 2024, 46% of sentences were within the guideline range. Robbery cases were within the range less often than that.

## Supervised Release, Fines, and Restitution

1,289 people (99%) were ordered to serve supervised release after prison. The median supervised release term was 36 months.

A fine was ordered for 25 people (2%). Restitution, which is money paid to compensate a victim, was ordered for 837 (64%).

## Criminal History

28% of the people sentenced under §2B3.1 in fiscal year 2024 were in the lowest criminal history category I. 15% were in the highest category VI.

Court-martial records have no criminal history field, so this measure cannot be compared with military cases. The U.S. Sentencing Commission's offense type for all 1,305 of these cases is Robbery. There is no close court-martial counterpart for this guideline in the approved crosswalk, so this post reports the federal numbers on their own.

## Fiscal Year 2024 Within Fiscal Years 2016 to 2025

Fiscal year 2024 ran from October 1, 2023 to September 30, 2024\. In the previous year, 2023, 1,490 people were sentenced under §2B3.1, with a median prison term of 96 months and 40% within the guideline range. In the next year, 2025, there were 1,233 people, a median of 92 months, and 41% within the range.

Across fiscal years 2016 to 2025, 14,661 people were sentenced under this guideline. Of those, 99% were sent to prison, the median prison term was 92 months, and 95% pleaded guilty. The table shows each year. The 2024 median is about the same as the medians in several nearby years, so a single year here is not by itself a trend.

| Fiscal year | People sentenced | Median prison | Pleaded guilty |
| ----------- | ---------------- | ------------- | -------------- |
| 2016        | 1,582            | 87 months     | 94%            |
| 2017        | 1,544            | 84 months     | 94%            |
| 2018        | 1,691            | 90 months     | 95%            |
| 2019        | 1,805            | 95.5 months   | 95%            |
| 2020        | 1,297            | 87 months     | 95%            |
| 2021        | 1,290            | 93 months     | 96%            |
| 2022        | 1,424            | 97 months     | 95%            |
| 2023        | 1,490            | 96 months     | 95%            |
| 2024        | 1,305            | 96 months     | 94%            |
| 2025        | 1,233            | 92 months     | 95%            |

## What These Numbers Cannot Show

The U.S. Sentencing Commission counts only people who were convicted and sentenced. Acquittals and dismissals are not in the data, so the numbers cannot say how often robbery charges ended without a conviction.

The data also does not show the facts of any case, so it cannot explain why one person received a longer or shorter term than another.

### How We Counted

Everyone sentenced in federal court in fiscal year 2024 whose primary sentencing guideline was §2B3.1 (1,305), U.S. Sentencing Commission individual data files. The primary guideline is the one that set the offense level for the most serious count.

Federal fiscal years run from October 1 to September 30\. No person, judge, or lawyer is identified in any of these records.

### What to Keep in Mind

**No parole in federal prison; credit for good conduct.** Federal prison has no parole for crimes committed on or after November 1, 1987\. A federal prisoner can earn up to 54 days of good conduct credit for each year of the sentence the judge imposed, which is about 15%. Some federal prisoners can also earn First Step Act time credits, but many offenses make a person ineligible. The numbers in this post are the sentences judges imposed, not the time people actually served.

**Federal supervised release.** Most federal prison sentences are followed by a term of supervised release that the judge sets as part of the sentence. A person who violates it can be sent back to prison. A court-martial cannot sentence anyone to supervision after release. Military parole and mandatory supervised release are decided later by a board, not by the judge at trial.

**Who decides the sentence, and under what rules.** Federal judges sentence every federal case. They must calculate the Sentencing Guidelines range, which is advisory, and must impose any mandatory minimum the statute requires unless an exception applies. In courts-martial, the accused could choose sentencing by members until the rules changed. For cases in which every guilty finding is for an offense committed after December 27, 2023, a military judge sentences alone, within sentencing parameters. Courts-martial tried in 2024 and later include both old-rule and new-rule cases, and the data cannot tell them apart.

**Time periods.** Federal numbers are by federal fiscal year (October 1 to September 30), based on the sentencing date. The military numbers are by trial date. Neither source has the date of the offense, so a change in law shows up in either data set gradually.

**How life sentences and "time served" are counted.** In the federal numbers, a life sentence is counted as 470 months, and any other sentence longer than 470 months is counted as just under 470 months. A sentence of "time served" is counted as one day (0.03 months). Averages are affected by these rules; medians much less.

**Mandatory minimum sentences.** Many federal statutes on drugs, images of child exploitation, child sex abuse, and firearms carry mandatory minimum prison terms. The UCMJ has mandatory minimums only for a few offenses (a dishonorable discharge or dismissal for rape and sexual assault, and life for premeditated murder). Federal sentences for these offenses are partly set by Congress, not by the judge.

## Related Analysis

- [Military Moves Toward Sentencing Guidelines to Mirror the Federal System](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/military-sentencing-guidelines-federal-system/) (the background article)
- [Federal Prosecution Analysis](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal/) (all federal posts)
- [How the Federal Comparison Data Was Built](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal-data-methodology/) (sources and method)
- [§2B3.1 Robbery: Federal Sentences, FY2016–2025](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal-guideline-2b3-1-robbery/) (overview)
- [§2B3.1 Robbery: Federal Sentences, Fiscal Year 2023](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal-guideline-2b3-1-robbery-fy2023/) (previous or next fiscal year)
- [§2B3.1 Robbery: Federal Sentences, Fiscal Year 2025](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal-guideline-2b3-1-robbery-fy2025/) (previous or next fiscal year)
- [How Often Federal Judges Sentence Outside the Guideline Range](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal-sentences-outside-guideline-range/)
- [Mandatory Minimums: How Many Federal Sentences Are Set by Congress](https://www.bodiesburied.com/trends/federal-mandatory-minimum-sentences/)
- [U.S. Sentencing Commission, Individual Offender Datafiles](https://www.ussc.gov/research/datafiles/commission-datafiles?ref=bodiesburied.com) (source)
- [Federal Judicial Center, Integrated Database (criminal defendants)](https://www.fjc.gov/research/idb?ref=bodiesburied.com) (source)

**About the author.** Jocelyn C. Stewart is a retired Army JAG with more than 24 years of trying courts-martial and more than 200 jury trials. She hosts *Where All The Bodies Are Buried* and runs the [Law Office of Jocelyn C. Stewart](https://www.ucmj-defender.com/?ref=bodiesburied.com). This analysis is for education and information only. It is not legal advice, and every case is different.