North Carolina Criminal Law Blog

Sometimes there is a delay between when the court pronounces a sentence and when the judgment is actually signed. When that happens, questions can arise about when the sentence begins. […]

Today’s post is a return to the Sentencing Whiteboard, this time to explain active sentences for aggravated level one DWI. As Shea and I have discussed in earlier posts (here, here, and here, among others), they are different from other DWI sentences. No parole. No good time. Not cut in half. The video explains why, and describes how typical aggravated level one sentences are administered by the county jails through the Statewide Misdemeanant Confinement Program. As you’ll see, sentences for this most serious level of misdemeanor impaired driving are in many cases longer than a felony habitual DWI. I hope you’ll take a look. 

Last week, through a North Carolina Judicial College program, a group of judges, lawyers, and clerks visited DART Cherry, the state’s lone residential chemical dependency treatment facility for male probationers and parolees. It was an informative visit that, frankly, busted some myths about DART Cherry. Today’s post passes along some of what we learned.

May the judge sentencing a conviction now order that it run consecutively to sentences the defendant might get in the future?

When a person has so much jail credit that he has served his entire sentence of imprisonment, may he nonetheless be sentenced to probation? In other words, may a court sentence someone to probation when there is no sentence left to suspend?

Two new cases from the court of appeals, both involving defendants named Johnson, shed more light on the meaning of “absconding” from probation.

Aside from a few notable exceptions (impaired driving, drug trafficking, and first-degree murder), most North Carolina crimes are sentenced under Structured Sentencing. Some crimes have additional sentencing wrinkles—a kind of Structured Sentencing plus—that kick in by statute. Today’s post is a noncomprehensive list of some of the most common offense-specific sentencing provisions.

It’s like Fight Club: the first rule of talking about sentencing at trial is don’t talk about sentencing at trial.

Let’s brainstorm all the possible sentences for a Prior Record Level I defendant convicted of two Class H felonies. I’ll go first, listing my thoughts roughly from most to least severe (from the defendant’s point of view).

Under G.S. 15A-1340.16(d), “[e]vidence necessary to prove an element of the offense shall not be used to prove any factor in aggravation.” The general idea behind that rule is to prevent the defendant from getting extra punishment via an aggravating factor for something that is inherent in the crime of conviction. A similar prohibition existed under Fair Sentencing, so we have a relatively large body of case law that helps us understand the rule.