The Maryland General Assembly created the Maryland State Commission on Criminal Sentencing Policy (MSCCSP) in 1999 as an independent agency to support fair and proportional sentencing policy and to maintain the State’s voluntary sentencing guidelines for criminal cases sentenced in the circuit courts. The MSCCSP is responsible for collecting and automating the sentencing guidelines worksheets, maintaining the sentencing guidelines database, monitoring circuit court sentencing practice, adopting changes to the guidelines consistent with the sentencing practices of Maryland circuit court judges, and providing training and orientation to criminal justice practitioners who apply the sentencing guidelines.
News
July 10, 2026: Proposed amendments to the sentencing guidelines were published in the July 10, 2026, issue of the Maryland Register (Volume 53, Issue 14). The purpose of the proposed amendments is to remove select fields from the sentencing guidelines worksheet that lack direct utility to the sentencing guidelines and/or the work of the MSCCSP. Additionally, the proposed amendments reorganize the instructions for scoring victim injury, expand the definition of physical victim injury (part C of the offense score) and add examples of minor, non-permanent, and permanent injuries. Lastly, the proposed amendments clarify that an individual is not involved with the criminal justice system for the purposes of calculating the offender score if the individual’s only involvement is to comply with the ongoing reporting requirements associated with sex offender registration in the State or elsewhere. Comments on the proposed amendments will be accepted through August 30, 2026.
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