§2J1.6 Failure to Appear by Defendant: Federal Sentences, Fiscal Year 2021
In fiscal year 2021, 83% of the 24 people sentenced under guideline §2J1.6 received a sentence within the guideline range: 20 people. All 24 pleaded guilty and all 24 received a prison term, with a median of 13.5 months.
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In brief: In fiscal year 2021, 83% of the 24 people sentenced under guideline §2J1.6 received a sentence within the guideline range: 20 people. All 24 pleaded guilty and all 24 received a prison term, with a median of 13.5 months.
This post uses the U.S. Sentencing Commission's records of 24 people sentenced in federal court in fiscal year 2021. 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 series, which builds on Military Moves Toward Sentencing Guidelines to Mirror the Federal System. How the numbers were built: How the Federal Comparison Data Was Built.
Most Sentences Were Within the Guideline Range
The U.S. Sentencing Commission counted 24 people in fiscal year 2021 whose primary guideline was §2J1.6, "Failure to Appear by Defendant." For 20 of them (83%), the sentence was within the guideline range. It was below the range without a government request for 3 (13%) and above the range for 1 (4%). No sentence was below the range at the government's request.
The within-range share was 58% in 2020 and 56% in 2022. It was 61% across all years for this guideline. For all federal cases in 2021, it was 43%. A share of 83% from 24 people is a small-group figure. The records give no basis for saying whether it will repeat, or what led to it.
Guilty Pleas and Prison Terms
All 24 people (100%) pleaded guilty, and none was convicted after a trial. All 24 (100%) received a prison term, and none received probation only.
The median prison term was 13.5 months. A quarter received 18.2 months or more, and a quarter received 8.8 months or less. The median was 15 months in 2020 and 10 months in 2022. The table lists every year.
| Fiscal year | People sentenced | Median prison | Pleaded guilty |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 41 | 12 months | 83% |
| 2017 | 40 | 13.5 months | 98% |
| 2018 | 30 | 12 months | 100% |
| 2019 | 34 | 13.7 months | 94% |
| 2020 | 24 | 15 months | 92% |
| 2021 | 24 | 13.5 months | 100% |
| 2022 | 27 | 10 months | 96% |
| 2023 | 31 | 12 months | 97% |
| 2024 | 30 | 12 months | 100% |
| 2025 | 29 | 12 months | 93% |
Plea Agreements and Mandatory Minimums
Written plea agreements were recorded for 67% of the guilty pleas, and the other 33% were straight pleas with no agreement. The Commission had mandatory minimum information for 23 of the 24 people, and none of the 23 (0%) was subject to one. A mandatory minimum is a prison term set by statute.
Supervised Release and Payments
Courts ordered supervised release to follow prison for 21 people (88%), with a median term of 36 months. Neither fines (0%) nor restitution (0%) were part of any sentence in this group. A fine goes to the government, while restitution repays a loss.
Criminal History
The Commission also records each person's criminal history category. Category I, the lowest, applied to 21% of the 24 people, and category VI, the highest, applied to 13%. Military court records do not have this field, so no court-martial figure can be placed next to these.
How 2021 Fits Into the Federal Totals
Across every guideline, 57,287 people were sentenced in federal court in fiscal year 2021. Their median prison term was 29 months, and 98% pleaded guilty.
Over fiscal years 2016 to 2025, 310 people were sentenced under §2J1.6. Of those, 98% were sent to prison, the median prison term was 12 months, and 95% pleaded guilty. The Commission classes these cases as Administration of Justice offenses.
Limits of the Records
Fiscal year 2021 ran from October 1, 2020 to September 30, 2021. Anyone who was acquitted or whose case was dismissed is absent from the data. The prison terms reported are the sentences announced, not the months actually spent in custody.
The approved crosswalk has no close court-martial counterpart for this guideline, so this post reports the federal numbers on their own.
How We Counted
Everyone sentenced in federal court in fiscal year 2021 whose primary sentencing guideline was §2J1.6 (24), 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.
Related Analysis
- Military Moves Toward Sentencing Guidelines to Mirror the Federal System (the background article)
- Federal Prosecution Analysis (all federal posts)
- How the Federal Comparison Data Was Built (sources and method)
- §2J1.6 Failure to Appear by Defendant: Federal Sentences, FY2016–2025 (overview)
- §2J1.6 Failure to Appear by Defendant: Federal Sentences, Fiscal Year 2020 (previous or next fiscal year)
- §2J1.6 Failure to Appear by Defendant: Federal Sentences, Fiscal Year 2022 (previous or next fiscal year)
- How Often Federal Judges Sentence Outside the Guideline Range
- Mandatory Minimums: How Many Federal Sentences Are Set by Congress
- U.S. Sentencing Commission, Individual Offender Datafiles (source)
- Federal Judicial Center, Integrated Database (criminal defendants) (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. This analysis is for education and information only. It is not legal advice, and every case is different.