Latest posts in category Sentencing on North Carolina Criminal Law Blog

When a person is convicted and sentenced, the sentence generally starts right away. G.S. 15A-1353(a). The judge can delay the start of the sentence, as discussed in this prior post, […]

Is it a crime to attempt to drive while impaired? Consider these facts. Suppose a law enforcement officer sees a person stumble to a car outside of a bar, unlock […]

As I’ve noted in prior posts, some people just want to serve their time in prison. For one reason or another, they do not want to be on probation. For […]

Thousands of defendants are sentenced to unsupervised probation each year. They are often first offenders who have been convicted of not-so-serious crimes, so you don’t read much about them in […]

A defendant’s prior North Carolina juvenile adjudications never count for sentencing points. That is true for felonies and misdemeanors alike. The definition of a “prior conviction” in Structured Sentencing (G.S. […]

Today’s post is about a recurrent question related to jail credit for periods of confinement in response to violation (CRV). First, a 30-second refresher on the basics of CRV. When […]

Author’s Note:  The opinion discussed below was withdrawn on February 4, 2014 and replaced by an opinion discussed here.   How can a sentencing factor found by a judge that […]

The Justice Reinvestment Act made conditional discharge under G.S. 90-96(a) mandatory for eligible, consenting defendants. The law was amended last year to make it discretionary again for offenses committed on […]

This morning’s New York Times included an opinion piece by Bill Keller entitled America on Probation. It talks about the recent movement away from incarceration as the cornerstone of the […]

From 1995 to 2009, North Carolina had two sentencing grids—one for felonies, one for misdemeanors. That was it. Then the grid was amended in 2009. And 2011 (with special rules […]