A UNC School of Government Blog
In addition to enacting the aggravated level one punishment for impaired driving discussed here, the 2011 General Assembly amended the requirements for imposing a Level One impaired driving sentence, effective for offenses committed on or after December 1, 2011. Most readers likely are familiar with the sentencing scheme set forth in G.S. 20-179, which governs … Read more
In North Carolina a probationer has a statutory right to counsel at a probation violation hearing. G.S. 15A-1345(e); G.S. 7A-451(a)(4). The probationer can also waive the right to assistance of counsel and proceed pro se, Faretta v. California, 422 U.S. 806 (1975), but before that can happen the trial court must determine that the waiver … Read more
Jeff mentioned in this prior post that S.L. 2011-12 created three new drug trafficking crimes—trafficking in MDPV, mephedrone, and synthetic cannabinoids. I have incorporated those new crimes (effective for offenses committed on or after June 1, 2011) into my tabular summary of the drug trafficking law, available here. The front page of the chart includes … Read more
In 2010, the Uniform Law Commission (also known as the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws) adopted the Uniform Collateral Consequence of Conviction Act to assist states in developing strategies for addressing the collateral consequences of a criminal conviction. Collateral consequences are effects that generally are not imposed as part of a criminal … Read more
The court of appeals issued opinions today. I haven’t looked at all of them, but State v. Best jumped out at me because it provides an authoritative answer to a question that I have often been asked: when a defendant is convicted of possession of a firearm by a felon, may his prior felony (the … Read more
One of the goals of the Justice Reinvestment Act is to have more misdemeanants serve their time in the county jail instead of the Department of Correction. I’ll write soon about the new rules for determining where a sentence should be served (you should disregard this prior post on that subject). In the meantime, it … Read more
Shea Denning summarized S.L. 2011-191, Laura’s Law, in a prior post. To recap, the law adds a new punishment level for impaired driving sentencing, Aggravated Level One (hereinafter Level A1), for situations in which three or more grossly aggravating factors apply. Today’s post picks up on some of the points Shea mentioned in her earlier … Read more
I mentioned in my previous post that the Justice Reinvestment Act (JRA) is not the only new legislation that impacts post-release supervision (PRS). This post looks at S.L. 2011-307, which changes the way PRS applies to sex offenders. (I also mentioned that I would talk about post-release supervision for certain impaired drivers under Laura’s Law, … Read more
Under existing law, only Class B1 through E felonies get post-release supervision (PRS). They are released from prison “on the date equivalent to [their] maximum imposed prison term less nine months, less any earned time,” G.S. 15A-1368.2(a), and their period of supervision in the community is generally 9 months. For sex offenders, period of supervision … Read more
I was at a meeting at the Department of Correction yesterday talking about some of the changes made by the Justice Reinvestment Act (JRA, summarized here). One of the big changes is an expansion of the conditions a probation officer may add through delegated authority under G.S. 15A-1343.2(e) and (f). In talking about those changes, … Read more