Highlights from the 2024 Sentencing Commission Statistical Report

Today’s post reviews the latest Structured Sentencing Statistical Report from the North Carolina Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission. This year’s report, based on data from Fiscal Year 2024, is available in full here. It is organized by sentencing episodes, defined as the most serious conviction for a defendant on a given day in court. The total number of felony and misdemeanor sentences has rebounded from the pandemic years, though the number of misdemeanor sentences (99,088) continues to be far lower than what it used to be (it was over 150,000 in 2010). That’s no surprise when you consider that, according to other court system data, misdemeanor filings and convictions have both decreased by over 40 percent over the last decade. Felony convictions decreased by about 18 percent over the same time period. Most common grid cell, most common crimes. As usual, Class H–Level II was the most frequently used cell on the felony grid. It accounted for 2,415 sentences—almost 10 percent of all felony sentences. The most commonly sentenced felony is possession of firearm by felon. The most common misdemeanor is driving while license revoked (non-DWI). Jury trials continue to be rare. About 2 percent of all felony convictions (498 out of 26,079) were the result of a jury trial. There were 8 sentences imposed after a bench trial, twice as many as last year. Class H and I guilty pleas in district court. The number of Class H and I felony pleas handled in district court popped to 5,072 (31 percent of [...]