Under the federal fraud sentencing guidelines, loss is only the starting point. The dollar amount adds offense levels. The judge then adds or subtracts levels for the defendant's role and for acceptance of responsibility, applies any mandatory minimum such as aggravated identity theft, and weighs the factors in 18 U.S.C. 3553(a) before choosing a sentence.
Two federal sentencings announced on the same day show how much those other steps matter. On Sept. 30, 2026, in federal court in Springfield, Mass., Jeannette Norman, 58, of Longmeadow, was sentenced to 22 months in prison for a commercial-loan fraud that caused more than $18 million in lender losses, Western Mass News reported. That same day, the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Inspector General posted a Justice Department release headlined "Three Fraudsters Sentenced to Combined 235 Months in Federal Prison for $16M Student Loan, PPP Fraud Schemes" in a case from the Eastern District of Michigan.
Both cases involved eight-figure dollar amounts and guilty pleas, yet the prison terms were very far apart. If you or someone close to you is facing a federal fraud charge, the reasons are worth understanding before any plea decision gets made.
The two cases at a glance
District of Massachusetts: United States v. Norman
Norman pleaded guilty on Sept. 19, 2025, to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and two counts of wire fraud, according to Hoodline and Bay State News. Bay State News reported that the conspiracy count carries up to 5 years and each wire fraud count carries up to 30 years.
Prosecutors said the scheme used false rent rolls and forged lease agreements to get commercial loans on properties in Springfield and East Longmeadow, Mass., and Enfield, Conn. The conspirators then made little or no payments before defaulting. A syndicated sentencing report on Yahoo News put losses at more than $18 million, including $5.37 million to Freedom Credit Union and $2 million to Workers Credit Union. At the plea stage, Hoodline and Bay State News described the losses as about $20 million.
U.S. District Judge Mark G. Mastroianni imposed 22 months in prison, 3 years of supervised release with 4 months of home confinement, and $18,203,030 in restitution, according to Erica Swallow's reporting.
Eastern District of Michigan: the Detroit student-aid case
According to a May 6, 2026 Department of Labor OIG release, Brandon Robinson, 42, of Detroit, pleaded guilty to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft. Prosecutors said that from January 2015 to February 2024 he submitted fraudulent federal student aid claims for more than 1,200 people at more than 100 schools in 24 states. About $16 million in aid was awarded and more than $10 million was paid out. The release also said he filed more than 100 fraudulent unemployment-insurance claims from April 2020 to March 2023, which paid out more than $1 million. Co-defendants Antonio Robinson and Joshuan Porter also pleaded guilty. The case is before U.S. District Judge Laurie J. Michelson. CBS Detroit also reported the plea.
"More than 1,000 fake students. A decade of fraud," U.S. Attorney Jerome Gorgon Jr. said in the May release. The September headline reported a combined 235 months for the three defendants.
How a federal fraud sentence is built
Every federal sentence starts with one rule. Under 18 U.S.C. 3553(a), the court "shall impose a sentence sufficient, but not greater than necessary." The judge must consider the offense, the defendant's history and characteristics, and "the need to avoid unwarranted sentence disparities among defendants with similar records who have been found guilty of similar conduct."
The U.S. Sentencing Guidelines turn those principles into a number. In a fraud case the steps run roughly like this:
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Start from the fraud guideline (§2B1.1) and add levels based on the loss amount.
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Adjust for role in the offense, acceptance of responsibility and other factors.
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Match the final offense level against the defendant's criminal history category on the sentencing table.
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Apply any mandatory minimums required by statute.
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Weigh the 3553(a) factors and decide whether to sentence inside, above or below the range.
Small changes in offense level make big differences in months. At Criminal History Category I (little or no prior record), the 2025 Sentencing Table gives these ranges:
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Level 19: 30-37 months
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Level 21: 37-46 months
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Level 23: 46-57 months
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Level 25: 57-71 months
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Level 27: 70-87 months
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Level 29: 87-108 months
Every 2 levels moves the range by months or even years. That is why each adjustment below gets fought over at sentencing.
Factor 1: Loss is the biggest number, not the only one
Under the current §2B1.1 loss table, losses over $550,000 add 14 levels and losses over $9.5 million add 20 levels, according to an April 2026 alert from Arnold & Porter. The dollar figures reported in both the Norman case and the Detroit case are above the $9.5 million line. So the loss figure on its own does not explain why one defendant got 22 months and the other case produced 235 months across three people.
A third case from the same week makes the point another way. On Oct. 2, 2026, U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen sentenced Emmanuel Olugbaike Finnih, 43, of Richmond, Texas, a former adjunct professor, to 78 months in prison plus 3 years of supervised release, KPRC Click2Houston reported. The fraud involved about $921,189 paid out on more than 100 fraudulent student-aid applications. He pleaded guilty March 20, 2026. His loss was a small fraction of Norman's, but his sentence was more than three times as long.
The lesson for anyone charged: a lower loss number does not guarantee a shorter sentence, and a higher one does not lock in a long one.
Factor 2: Your role inside the scheme
The guidelines treat leaders and bit players very differently. Under USSG §3B1.1, an organizer or leader of criminal activity involving five or more participants, or that was otherwise extensive, gets 4 more levels. A manager or supervisor gets 3 more, and other organizers, leaders, managers or supervisors get 2. Under §3B1.2, a "minimal participant" gets 4 levels off and a "minor participant" gets 2 off.
The gap between the top role adjustment and the bottom one is 8 levels. On the table above, that is the difference between level 21 (37-46 months) and level 29 (87-108 months).
Norman's own case shows how role works. Three people convicted in one conspiracy got very different sentences:
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Louis Masaschi, her husband: 4 years in prison and $18,203,030 in restitution, sentenced in July 2026.
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Jeannette Norman: 22 months in prison, 3 years of supervised release with 4 months of home confinement, and $18,203,030 in restitution.
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Christine Gendron, her sister and a CPA: 6 months in prison plus 6 months of home confinement and $392,607 in restitution.
Those figures come from Erica Swallow and the Yahoo News sentencing report. Norman's plea agreement described her as a "minimal participant," according to an Aug. 11, 2026 syndicated report. That label carries the largest reduction available under §3B1.2.
Factor 3: The charges set the floor
Which counts you plead to can matter as much as anything the judge decides. Wire fraud, the charge in Norman's case, carries no mandatory minimum. Aggravated identity theft is different.
Under 18 U.S.C. 1028A, aggravated identity theft adds "a term of imprisonment of 2 years" on top of the sentence for the underlying felony, and that term cannot "run concurrently with any other term of imprisonment." The May 2026 Labor Department release listed Brandon Robinson's exposure as up to 20 years for wire fraud plus a mandatory consecutive 24 months for aggravated identity theft.
In practice, a 1028A count stacks two years onto whatever the fraud count produces, and the judge cannot fold it in. That gets decided at the charging and plea stage, long before sentencing. If your case involves other people's names, Social Security numbers or other identifying information, ask your lawyer early whether a 1028A count is on the table and whether it can be negotiated.
Factor 4: Acceptance of responsibility and plea timing
Norman, the three Detroit defendants and Finnih all pleaded guilty. Under the guidelines' acceptance-of-responsibility provision, §3E1.1, a defendant who clearly shows acceptance of responsibility gets 2 levels off. One more level can come off on a government motion when the offense level is 16 or higher and the defendant gave timely notice of an intent to plead guilty, according to the Sentencing Commission's archived guideline text.
That third level depends on timing and on the prosecutor filing the motion. Waiting until the eve of trial can cost it. Because nearly everyone who pleads gets some version of this reduction, it rarely explains differences between defendants who all pleaded. It does explain why going to trial and losing usually costs more than pleading.
Factor 5: Cooperation
Defendants who give the government substantial help in investigating or prosecuting others can earn a prosecution motion asking the court to sentence below the guideline range. That decision belongs to the prosecutor, not the defendant or the judge. None of the reports cited in this article say that any of these defendants received a cooperation reduction, so it should not be assumed to explain any of these outcomes.
The plea recommendation is not the sentence
Norman's plea agreement included a sentencing recommendation of 45 months, according to the Aug. 11 report. Judge Mastroianni imposed 22 months, less than half of that. In federal court, a recommendation in a plea agreement generally does not bind the judge. The court has its own duty under 3553(a) to find the sentence that is sufficient but not greater than necessary.
The case also shows a risk that runs the other way. Before sentencing, prosecutors moved to withdraw from Norman's plea deal. They argued she had concealed about $760,000 held in a trust that they called "directly traceable to the frauds." Judge Mastroianni denied the motion, saying, "The history is definitely cloudy," and took a separate forfeiture motion under advisement, the report said.
The takeaway: a plea agreement depends on full and honest disclosure, especially of assets. If the government believes you hid money, it may try to back out of the deal. Norman's deal survived, but the fight put it at risk.
Timing matters now: the loss table changes Nov. 1, 2026
The U.S. Sentencing Commission's 2026 Inflationary Adjustment Amendment adjusts "monetary tables and values in the guidelines for inflation." It takes effect "November 1, 2026 absent Congressional action to the contrary."
According to the Arnold & Porter alert, the amendment raises two key loss thresholds:
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The over-$550,000 threshold (+14 levels) moves to $750,000.
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The over-$9.5 million threshold (+20 levels) moves to $15 million.
Courts apply the guidelines in effect on the date of sentencing. So a defendant whose loss falls between the old and new thresholds could see a lower offense level if sentenced on or after Nov. 1. The alert notes that defense counsel may ask to adjourn a sentencing until after the change takes effect. If your sentencing date is coming up and your loss figure sits near one of these lines, raise this with your lawyer right away.
What to do if you're charged with federal fraud
These cases point to specific questions to raise with your defense attorney:
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How is loss being calculated? Ask what figure the government is using, what it includes and whether it can be challenged. Reported loss totals in the Norman case varied by source, which shows how much room there can be for dispute.
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What role adjustment applies to me? The difference between a leadership increase and a minimal-participant reduction can be 8 levels.
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Do any counts carry a mandatory minimum? An aggravated identity theft count adds 2 years that cannot overlap with the fraud sentence.
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When should I decide on a plea? Timely notice affects whether the third acceptance-of-responsibility level is available.
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Have I disclosed every asset? Incomplete disclosure can give prosecutors grounds to try to withdraw from a plea deal.
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When is my sentencing relative to Nov. 1, 2026? The new loss thresholds may lower your range.
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Is the recommended sentence the likely sentence? Ask how the assigned judge treats plea recommendations and what mitigation evidence could support a lower sentence under 3553(a).
A federal fraud sentence is built from several decisions, and many of them get made well before anyone stands in front of a judge. Getting experienced counsel involved early gives you the most room to shape them.
Related reading
Sources
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Western Mass News: Longmeadow woman sentenced in property loan fraud scheme
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Yahoo News: Mass. woman who once worked at Goldman Sachs sentenced in loan fraud scheme
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Yahoo News: Bid by feds to cancel woman's Longmeadow bank fraud plea deal fails
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Erica Swallow: Downtown Springfield: The Forgotten Victim of a $20 Million Bank Fraud Scheme
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Hoodline: Longmeadow Woman Guilty in $20 Million Loan Fraud Conspiracy
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Bay State News: Longmeadow woman pleads guilty to multimillion-dollar loan fraud
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DOL OIG: Detroiter pleads guilty in $16M federal student aid fraud scheme (May 6, 2026)
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CBS Detroit: Detroit man pleads guilty in $16 million federal student aid fraud case
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ED OIG: Three Fraudsters Sentenced to Combined 235 Months in Federal Prison (Michigan)
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KPRC Click2Houston: Richmond man sentenced to 78 months for student aid fraud
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Arnold & Porter: Inflation as Good News: US Sentencing Commission Raises Bar on Loss Thresholds
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