Can anyone give a reasonable argument for why mail fraud carries a maximum sentence of 20 years? That seems ludicrous in the extreme. Why does mail fraud incur a greater penalty than rape, kidnapping, and most forms of murder?
People fixate on the maximum sentences when they should focus instead on the minimums (here, 10 months). Just by nature of what "mail fraud" investigations represent, you're bound to get wild swings from case to case.
To threaten defendants, they also stack each single charge one on top of each other to make 5 cases look like a maximum of 125 years too.