A UNC School of Government Blog
The Justice Reinvestment Act became law in 2011. S.L. 2011-192. Even before its initial effective date it was amended in 2011 by a technical corrections act. S.L. 2011-412. It was amended again by a clarifications act in 2012, making the changes described here. S.L. 2012-188. Two weeks ago it was amended yet again, effective (in … Read more
May a judge delegate to a probation officer the task of setting the amount of restitution owed to a victim? For several reasons, my standard answer to that recurring question is no. The main reason for my answer is the restitution statutes themselves. The law says that restitution should be ordered “when sentencing a defendant,” … Read more
How specific does a probation violation report need to be about which condition the probationer allegedly violated? Until last week, I would have said “not very.” A new case from the court of appeals has made me change my answer. The case is State v. Tindall. In it, a woman was ordered to attend a … Read more
It’s been over two years since I recorded my first video blog post. With the help of School of Government multimedia developer Jamar Jones, I prepared another one for today. In it, I try to show how Structured Sentencing is not very structured for many defendants—especially when multiple convictions are sentenced together. I hope you’ll … Read more
I recently completed a draft of a bulletin on probation violations. It is working its way through our internal review process. In the meantime, I thought I would post it on the blog and open it up for wider comment. There have been many changes in this area of the law in the past 5 … Read more
Can a probation officer arrest a person being supervised pursuant to a deferred prosecution agreement or G.S. 90-96 judgment? I’ve been asked that question a lot lately. I suspect it is coming up more often now that G.S. 90-96 is mandatory for consenting defendants. The short answer, in my opinion, is that when a probation … Read more
As I traveled around the state teaching about the Justice Reinvestment Act, I had lots of discussions about the various types of confinement that can now be ordered in response to a probation violation (splits, dips, dunks, and so forth—they’re all catalogued here). That conversation almost always included a discussion of jail credit. The general … Read more
“Only an idiot drives on the sidewalk to avoid a school bus.” So read a sign that an Ohio judge ordered a woman to wear after being convicted for the acts caught on video here. Apparently it was not an isolated incident. A parent whose daughter rode the bus said the defendant “did this almost … Read more
Some probationers are subject to a curfew—a time each day (usually in the evening or at night) when they are restricted to their residence. Recent changes to the law have generated some questions about curfews. In particular, there appears to be some confusion about whether a curfew can or must be monitored electronically. This post … Read more
Under the Justice Reinvestment Act, a probation officer may, through delegated authority, impose a short period of jail confinement in response to a violation of a court-imposed probation condition. The officer may impose up to six days of confinement per month during any three separate months of a period of probation. The time must be … Read more