2016年12月四级第3套选词填空原文翻译及答案解析

When someone commits a criminal act, we always hope the punishment will match the offense. But when it comes to one of the cruelest crimes—animal fighting—things __26__ work out that way. Dog-fighting victims are __27__ and killed for profit and "sport," yet their criminal abusers often receive a __28__ sentence for causing a lifetime of pain. Roughly half of all federally-convicted animal fighters only get probation (缓刑).

当有人犯下刑事罪行时，我们总是希望惩罚能与罪行相匹配。但涉及到最残忍的犯罪之一——动物搏斗——事情却鲜少如此。斗狗受害者为牟利和“运动”遭折磨和杀害，然而施加终身痛苦的犯罪施虐者往往只获轻判。大约一半被联邦定罪的动物搏斗者仅获缓刑。

Some progress has been made in the prosecution (起诉) of animal fighters. But federal judges often rely heavily on the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines when they __29__ penalties, and in the case of animal fighting, those guidelines are outdated and extremely __30__.

在起诉动物搏斗者方面已取得一些进展。但联邦法官在确定刑罚时往往严重依赖《美国量刑指南》，而在动物搏斗案件中，这些指南已过时且极度不足。

The U.S. Sentencing Commission, which __31__ these sentencing guidelines, is revisiting them, proposing to raise the minimum sentence from 6-12 to 21-27 months. This is a step in the right __32__, but we'd like to see the U.S. Sentencing Commission make further changes to the guidelines.

制定这些量刑指南的美国量刑委员会正重新审视它们，提议将最低刑期从6-12个月提高到21-27个月。这是朝正确方向迈出的一步，但我们希望美国量刑委员会对指南做出进一步修改。

Along with this effort, we're working with animal advocates and state and federal lawmakers to __33__ anti-cruelty laws across the country, as well as supporting laws and policies that assist because the high animal __34__ that care for animal fighting victims. This help is __35__ important because the high cost of caring for animal victims is a major factor that prevents people from getting involved in cruelty cases in the first place.

除了这一努力，我们还与动物倡导者及州和联邦立法者合作，以加强全国反虐待法律，并支持协助收容动物搏斗受害者的动物收容所的法律和政策。这种帮助至关重要，因为照顾动物受害者的高昂成本是阻止人们最初介入虐待案件的主要因素。