Describes the processing of defendants in the Federal criminal justice system. The report includes the number and disposition of suspects investigated by U.S. attorneys, the number of arrests for Federal offenses, the number of defendants in cases filed in U.S. district courts, sanctions imposed on criminal defendants, the number of persons under Federal correctional supervision (probation, parole, supervised released, and incarceration), and trends in annual Federal criminal case processing. This report is the latest in the annual Federal Criminal Case Processing series.

• During 2001 U.S. attorneys initiated investigations involving 121,818 suspects for possible violations of Federal law.
• U.S. attorneys declined to prosecute a smaller proportion of those investigated, as declinations of matters concluded decreased from 36% during 1994 to 27% during 2001.
• The proportion of defendants sentenced to prison increased from 65% during 1994 to 74% during 2001.