The judge may also listen to recommendations from the victim. Much less than they once did. Judges used to have discretion to sentence anything from probation to the maximum time for the charge. But today, in the federal courts and in many state courts, judges must follow sentencing guidelines, which give them a fixed range of years that varies depending on the type of crime and the defendant's criminal history. Convicted defendants may be given fines, sentenced to imprisonment or both.
Probation is another option.
So is a suspended sentence, which means that a person doesn't do jail time, but if he or she is arrested again during probation, the sentence then has to be served, in addition to whatever sentence the person gets for the second offense. If a person is convicted of more than one charge, there will be a sentence for each charge. Recently there has been a movement to restrict further judges' freedom to set sentences. While the stated reason is to ensure greater uniformity regardless of which judge a defendant gets, some critics have charged that the reformer's real agenda is to increase punishments. One method followed by many state legislatures is to introduce mandatory sentences for specified crimes.