Quick Dips

As I mentioned in a prior post, the Justice Reinvestment Act (S.L. 2011-192) creates a new set of “community and intermediate probation conditions” that can be ordered in any Structured Sentencing probation case. One of the new community and intermediate conditions, available for defendants on probation for offenses committed on or after December 1, 2011, is a new form of short term jail confinement that some have referred to as “quick dips.” Under new G.S. 15A-1343(a1)(3), the court can order up to six days of jail confinement during any three separate months of a period of probation, for a total confinement time of up to 18 days. The time must be served in 2-day or 3-day increments, meaning the maximum number of individual “dips” a person could face in a single case is nine (three 2-day dips in three separate months). If the defendant is on probation for multiple judgments, confinement periods must run concurrently and may still total no more than six days per month. Quick dip time is served in a “local confinement facility”—a jail—never prison. Like periods of confinement in response to violation (“CRV” periods, discussed here), quick dips look a little like special probation. But they are not a split sentence. They are not subject to the length limitations of G.S. 15A-1351(a) and G.S. 15A-1344(e), which cap a split sentence at one-fourth of the maximum sentence imposed. Unlike CRV, though, quick dip confinement can be ordered at sentencing. In fact, quick dips are the only type of [...]