2021 Sentencing Commission Statistical Report Available

Today’s post takes a look at the latest Structured Sentencing Statistical Report from the North Carolina Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission. This year’s report, available in full here, is based on data from Fiscal Year 2021. It is therefore the first report in which we can see a full year’s worth of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sentencing volume and practice. As always, remember that the report is based on sentencing episodes, defined as the most serious conviction for a defendant on a given day of court. There were 21,293 felony sentencing episodes during the report period, down from 24,027 in the previous year and 28,526 in the year before that. There were 81,276 misdemeanor episodes, down from 96,812 in the previous year. That continues a downward trend in misdemeanor convictions that long predates the pandemic. To illustrate, there were over 150,000 misdemeanor convictions in 2010. Most common grid cell. As usual, Class H/Level II was the most frequently used of the 60 cells on the felony grid. It accounted for 2,309 sentences, which is—as it is almost every year—about 11 percent of all felony convcitions. Class A/Level V and Class A/Level VI were the least frequently used cells; they weren’t used at all. The vast majority of felonies, 88 percent, are low-level felonies (those in Class F through I). Even fewer jury trials. You probably won’t be surprised to hear that there were very few convictions resulting from jury trials during this reporting period. There were 185 convictions by a [...]