North Carolina Criminal Law NC Criminal Law

Committing a new criminal offense while on probation is a violation of probation. Nowadays it’s one of the only things for which a person may be revoked. Sometimes the parties wait to see whether a new criminal charge will result in a conviction before proceeding on it as a violation of probation. Sometimes they don’t. Either way, when you have two different courts (the probation court and the trial court) considering roughly the same issue (did this person commit a crime?), you run into issues like double jeopardy, collateral estoppel, and inconsistent results. Today’s post considers some of the possibilities. Continue reading →