18 U.S.C. 201, Bribery of public officials and witnesses: How Federal Cases Ended, FY2016–2025
From fiscal year 2016 to 2025, 543 federal defendants had their cases end with a most serious charge under 18 U.S.C. 201. Juries decided all 24 trials and acquitted in 1 (4%), and 482 of the 543 (89%) were convicted. A prison term followed for 352 of the 482 convicted (73%), and the median term was
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In brief: From fiscal year 2016 to 2025, 543 federal defendants had their cases end with a most serious charge under 18 U.S.C. 201. Juries decided all 24 trials and acquitted in 1 (4%), and 482 of the 543 (89%) were convicted. A prison term followed for 352 of the 482 convicted (73%), and the median term was 18 months.
This post uses the Federal Judicial Center's records of 543 federal defendants whose cases ended in fiscal years 2016 to 2025. The series also draws on the U.S. Sentencing Commission's records of 659,036 people sentenced 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.
Jury Trials and the Single Acquittal
In the U.S. Code, Title 18, section 201 is headed "Bribery of public officials and witnesses". Of the 543 defendants counted under it, 24 (4%) went to trial.
Every one of those 24 trials was a jury trial. No bench trial, decided by a judge alone, appears in the records for this section.
Juries acquitted in 1 trial, which is 4% of the 24. The only acquittal came in fiscal year 2022. In each of the other years with trials, the trials ended without an acquittal.
How Most Section 201 Cases Ended
A guilty plea ended 459 cases (85%). Dismissals ended 60 more (11%).
These counts come from the Federal Judicial Center, which includes every defendant whose case ended. Acquittals and dismissals are counted along with convictions.
Dismissed, in this data, includes charges dropped on the government's motion. One example is a dismissal after the defendant pleaded guilty in a separate case. A dismissal does not mean a court found the defendant not guilty.
Charge Level and Prison Terms
The records list all 543 charges as felonies. There were 0 Class A misdemeanors and 0 petty offenses.
Among the 482 convicted, 352 (73%) received a prison term on the section 201 charge. The rest were convicted without one on this charge.
The median of 18 months covers only those whose term was 1 month or more. It is the middle term in that group and does not reflect the longest or shortest sentences.
Defendants by Type of Counsel
This section uses the type of counsel recorded at the end of the case. Defendants with a hired lawyer and those with an appointed lawyer face different charges and circumstances. The figures describe groups of cases, not the quality of lawyers.
Retained private counsel appeared for 276 defendants (51%). That group pleaded guilty in 87% of cases and had 7% dismissed. Of its 17 trials, none ended in an acquittal (0%).
CJA panel attorneys, private lawyers appointed by the court, represented 155 defendants (29%). They had a 92% plea share and a 5% dismissal share. Of their 5 trials, 1 ended in an acquittal (1 of 5).
Federal public or community defenders represented 83 defendants (15%). The plea share was 92% and the dismissal share 6%. Their 2 trials ended without an acquittal (0 of 2).
| Type of counsel at the end of the case | Defendants | Pleaded guilty | Dismissed | Trials | Acquitted at trial |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Federal public or community defender | 83 | 92% | 6% | 2 | 0 (0 of 2) |
| CJA panel attorney | 155 | 92% | 5% | 5 | 1 (1 of 5) |
| Private (retained) counsel | 276 | 87% | 7% | 17 | 0 (0%) |
Changes Across Fiscal Years
The yearly number of cases ranged from 29 in fiscal year 2025 to 75 in fiscal year 2018.
Fiscal year 2018 also had the highest dismissal share in the table, 29%, and the lowest plea share, 68%. Fiscal year 2021 had a 98% plea share and no trials.
Federal fiscal years run from October 1 into the next calendar year. The records cannot show whether any yearly change reflects a shift in prosecution or simply the cases that happened to end that year.
| Fiscal year | Cases ended | Pleaded guilty | Dismissed | Trials | Acquitted at trial |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 74 | 81% | 12% | 5 | 0 (0 of 5) |
| 2017 | 64 | 88% | 5% | 5 | 0 (0 of 5) |
| 2018 | 75 | 68% | 29% | 2 | 0 (0 of 2) |
| 2019 | 51 | 82% | 12% | 3 | 0 (0 of 3) |
| 2020 | 44 | 89% | 7% | 2 | 0 (0 of 2) |
| 2021 | 42 | 98% | 2% | 0 | 0 |
| 2022 | 55 | 89% | 9% | 1 | 1 (1 of 1) |
| 2023 | 51 | 92% | 2% | 3 | 0 (0 of 3) |
| 2024 | 58 | 88% | 9% | 2 | 0 (0 of 2) |
| 2025 | 29 | 79% | 17% | 1 | 0 (0 of 1) |
What Remains Unknown
No close court-martial counterpart for section 201 exists in the approved crosswalk, so there is no military comparison here.
Defendants are grouped by the most serious charge at the end of the case. The records do not explain the choices behind a plea, a dismissal, or a verdict, and they hold no details about the conduct in any case.
How We Counted
Every federal defendant whose case ended in fiscal years 2016 to 2025 and whose most serious charge at the end of the case (TTITLE1) was under 18 U.S.C. 201, any subsection (543), Federal Judicial Center, counted as in the federal courts' Table D-4. Type of counsel is TCOUNSEL; labels from the FJC criminal codebook. Section heading from the U.S. Code as published by the Office of the Law Revision Counsel (release point 119-136).
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
Who is in each set of numbers. The federal sentencing numbers come from the U.S. Sentencing Commission. They count only people who were convicted and sentenced in federal district court. People whose cases were dismissed or who were acquitted are not in them. The military numbers come from court-martial results, which include acquittals. To compare acquittal or dismissal rates, the federal side uses a different source: the Federal Judicial Center's case data, which counts every defendant whose case ended.
How "plea" and "trial" are counted. In the federal sentencing numbers, "trial" means the person was convicted after a trial, including people who pleaded guilty to some counts and went to trial on others. People acquitted at trial are not in these numbers at all (see "Who is in each set of numbers"). In the federal case data, the trial rate counts both convictions and acquittals at trial among all defendants whose cases ended, including dismissed cases. Military numbers count contested cases that reached a verdict. These denominators are not the same, and each post states the one it uses.
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.
Type of counsel describes groups of cases, not lawyers. The Federal Judicial Center records the type of counsel at the end of the case. Defendants who hire a lawyer differ from defendants who receive an appointed lawyer in their charges, criminal history, and circumstances, and some defendants change lawyers during a case. Differences in outcomes by type of counsel therefore cannot be credited to the type of lawyer.
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)
- 18 U.S.C. 152, Concealment of assets; false oaths and claims; bribery: How Federal Cases Ended, FY2016–2025 (same title of the U.S. Code)
- 18 U.S.C. 157, Bankruptcy fraud: How Federal Cases Ended, FY2016–2025 (same title of the U.S. Code)
- 18 U.S.C. 228, Failure to pay legal child support obligations: How Federal Cases Ended, FY2016–2025 (same title of the U.S. Code)
- 18 U.S.C. 231, Civil disorders: How Federal Cases Ended, FY2017–2025 (same title of the U.S. Code)
- Appointed vs. Retained Lawyers in Federal Criminal Cases: How Cases Ended, 2016–2025
- Are Courts-Martial More Likely to End in Acquittal Than Federal Trials?
- 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.