Are Minimum Mandatory Sentences Real?

Yes.

Since the mid 1980s legislatures across the country have been imposing minimum mandatory sentences.

Minimum mandatory sentences now exist for sexual offenders, battery on law-enforcement officers, drug related crimes such as drug trafficking and crimes in which a gun is used or displayed. Every year legislatures create more and more mandatory sentences and take sentencing options and authority away from judges.

A mandatory sentence cannot be ignored by a judge. Mandatory sentences are exactly that: minimum terms of incarceration.