When a defendant has multiple charges adjudicated together in the same hearing or trial, and those charges arose from the same underlying event or transaction, the court should assess costs only once. That’s the new rule according to State v. Rieger, a case recently decided by the court of appeals.
Jamie Markham
A Quarter-Century of Structured Sentencing
The governor has proclaimed today, October 1, 2019, as Structured Sentencing Day. It has been 25 years since North Carolina’s primary sentencing law for felonies and misdemeanors came into effect. Let’s take a moment to reflect on a quarter-century of grid-based sentencing.
Crimes Covered under the New Victims’ Rights Law
Which crimes are covered under the new victims’ rights amendment and its implementing statute?
Satellite-Based Monitoring Is Unconstitutional for All Unsupervised Recidivists
The Supreme Court of North Carolina held in State v. Grady, ___ N.C. ___ (2019), that satellite-based monitoring (SBM) of sex offenders is unconstitutional as applied to any unsupervised person who was ordered to enroll in SBM solely because he or she is a recidivist. By unsupervised, the court meant a person not on probation, parole, or post-release supervision. Today’s post takes a closer look at the Grady decision and what it may mean for North Carolina’s SBM program going forward.
State v. Morgan and Findings of Good Cause for a Hearing after Expiration
Under State v. Morgan, a case recently decided by the Supreme Court of North Carolina, a trial judge can’t act on a probation case after it has expired unless he or she makes a finding that there is “good cause shown and stated” to do so. In the short run, you’ll need to modify the forms to do it.
Case Summaries – Supreme Court of North Carolina
This post provides summaries of the opinions of the Supreme Court of North Carolina published on August 16, 2019.
Nonresident Registrants
In a previous post I wrote about the complexities of putting people on North Carolina’s sex offender registry for crimes committed in another state—including how a federal court found the lack of legal process for doing so unconstitutional, and how over half of the records I checked appeared to be incorrect. Today’s post considers the related issue of people on North Carolina’s registry who do not actually live in the state. Over 5,500 of the 25,000 people on North Carolina’s sex offender registry don’t reside here. Should they be on North Carolina’s registry at all? It’s not clear.
Sex Offender Registration for Out-of-State Offenses
There are about 25,000 people on North Carolina’s sex offender registry. Over 8,000 of them are registered for crimes committed in other states or in federal court. There are issues.