<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>dragonwriter</author><text>&amp;gt; To give some background on how his sentencing increased so dramatically&lt;p&gt;It didn&amp;#x27;t increase. His sentence was never anything else.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; initially he was convicted but since no one lost any money his sentencing guidelines were 0-12 months(most likely no jail time since it was his first offence).&lt;p&gt;False again. When the sentencing phase began, his lawyers argued there were no legal losses caused by his fraud, and prosecutors argued that losses were in the $9-20 million range. Both sides presented evidence and legal argument to support their position.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; As a general rule of thumb in federal fraud cases sentencing is primarily determined by the what&amp;#x27;s called the &amp;quot;loss amount&amp;quot; of the crime in question.&lt;p&gt;This much is correct.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; But a couple weeks ago the judge decided to come up with a HYPOTHETICAL loss and base the sentencing on that!&lt;p&gt;False; it was not a hypothetical loss amount. The court applied existing legal precedent that “loss in fraud cases includes the amount of property taken, even if all or part has been returned.” [0]&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.courthousenews.com&amp;#x2F;wp-content&amp;#x2F;uploads&amp;#x2F;2018&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;Shkreli-order.pdf&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.courthousenews.com&amp;#x2F;wp-content&amp;#x2F;uploads&amp;#x2F;2018&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;Shk...&lt;/a&gt;</text><parent_chain><item><author>dayaz36</author><text>To give some background on how his sentencing increased so dramatically, initially he was convicted but since no one lost any money his sentencing guidelines were 0-12 months(most likely no jail time since it was his first offence). As a general rule of thumb in federal fraud cases sentencing is primarily determined by the what&amp;#x27;s called the &amp;quot;loss amount&amp;quot; of the crime in question. But a couple weeks ago the judge decided to come up with a HYPOTHETICAL loss and base the sentencing on that! And that hypothetical loss was set at $10.4M! Meaning he just went from no jail time 7 years overnight. This seems beyond absurd and as far as I know has no precedence.</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Martin Shkreli has been sentenced to seven years in prison</title><url>https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/9/17097116/martin-shkreli-fraud-sentencing-prison</url></story>
<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>danso</author><text>Where are your sources that he was only facing 0-12 months when he was initially convicited? There are stories from the time of his conviction (in 2017) that say he could potentially face decades in prison:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.thestar.com&amp;#x2F;news&amp;#x2F;world&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;08&amp;#x2F;05&amp;#x2F;lack-of-remorse-could-bite-martin-shkreli-when-it-comes-time-for-sentencing-experts-say.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.thestar.com&amp;#x2F;news&amp;#x2F;world&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;08&amp;#x2F;05&amp;#x2F;lack-of-remors...&lt;/a&gt;</text><parent_chain><item><author>dayaz36</author><text>To give some background on how his sentencing increased so dramatically, initially he was convicted but since no one lost any money his sentencing guidelines were 0-12 months(most likely no jail time since it was his first offence). As a general rule of thumb in federal fraud cases sentencing is primarily determined by the what&amp;#x27;s called the &amp;quot;loss amount&amp;quot; of the crime in question. But a couple weeks ago the judge decided to come up with a HYPOTHETICAL loss and base the sentencing on that! And that hypothetical loss was set at $10.4M! Meaning he just went from no jail time 7 years overnight. This seems beyond absurd and as far as I know has no precedence.</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Martin Shkreli has been sentenced to seven years in prison</title><url>https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/9/17097116/martin-shkreli-fraud-sentencing-prison</url></story>