90-96 for Everything

G.S. 90-96 sets out a conditional discharge option for certain drug offenses. A conditional discharge is different from a deferred prosecution. In a conditional discharge program, the defendant is convicted (either after a trial or by pleading guilty), but then placed on probation without the court actually entering judgment in the case. If the defendant succeeds on probation, the court completes a “discharge and dismissal” and the defendant is left without a conviction. If the defendant fails on probation, the court enters judgment and sentences the defendant—often to probation again, but this time regular, post-conviction probation. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: G.S. 90-96 is complicated. I get as many questions about it as any other law. Justice Reinvestment made G.S. 90-96 mandatory for consenting defendants in 2011, but that requirement turned out to be troublesome enough in practice that the law was made discretionary again in 2013 (as described here). Despite the waxing and waning of G.S. 90-96, similar conditional discharge options have recently popped up elsewhere in the law. In 2013, a 90-96–style conditional discharge was made mandatory for defendants convicted of prostitution for the first time. G.S. 14-204(b). A bill signed into law this week, S.L. 2014-119 (H 369), took things even further, authorizing conditional discharge for any misdemeanor or Class H or I felony that would be eligible for a deferred prosecution. This broad conditional discharge authorization is set out in new G.S. 15A-1341(a4). As under the existing statutory deferred prosecution law, a defendant [...]