Category: Sentencing

Sex offenders register for a lifetime, but a bill would let some petition for removal

JEFFERSON CITY— Almost all sex offenders in Missouri are on a state registry for a lifetime, whether they made a one-time mistake, or made repeated or extreme offenses. Rep. Kurt Bahr, R-St. Charles, wants to make it possible for certain people to petition to remove their name from the list and for the registry to be more transparent for the…

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states minimu probation

Offenders on Federal Supervised Release Hits All-Time High

Number of Offenders on Federal Supervised Release Hits All-Time High Average inmate faces nearly four years of community monitoring after incarceration With nearly 190,000 inmates, the federal prison system is the largest in the nation, far exceeding those of California, Texas, and other states.1 But the reach of federal corrections extends well beyond prison walls. In 2015, approximately 115,000 offenders…

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THE COMPLICATED STATE OF FEDERAL SENTENCING

Over the past 15 years, the United States Supreme Court has decided a series of cases that dramatically changed the constitutional landscape of sentencing in the United States. In the first of these cases, Apprendi v. New Jersey, 5 the Supreme Court addressed the constitutionality of a statutory sentencing enhancement. That enhancement provided for an increase in the maximum sentence…

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aba journal

California makes it a felony for prosecutors to withhold or alter exculpatory evidence

More than two years into a dispute over alleged misconduct by Orange County, California, prosecutors trying a multiple-murder case, the state of California has made it a felony crime to withhold exculpatory evidence. According to the Los Angeles Times, the new state law makes it a felony, rather than a misdemeanor, for prosecutors to alter or intentionally withhold evidence that…

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Relief from the imposition of lifetime probation

Gary Douglas Peek seeks review of a term of lifetime probation imposed upon his conviction for an act of attempted child molestation that occurred between 1994 and 1996.   We conclude that lifetime probation was not available when Peek committed the crime and therefore vacate the trial court’s order placing him on lifetime probation. CONCURRING:  RUTH V. McGREGOR, Chief Justice,…

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pointing fingers

Avoid Generalizing Across All Sentencing Factors

From United States vs. Wolf Child http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2012/10/23/11-30241.pdf Sam E. Haddon, District Judge, Presiding First, the district court relied on the fact that Wolf Child is now a convicted sex offender. This runs contrary to our holding that “a generalized assessment based on the class of sex offenders generally, rather than on the particular sex offenses a defendant has committed or…

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