Twenty-Five Year Review of Sentences to Life Without Parole

I have started to get questions about G.S. 15A-1380.5, a repealed statute that used to provide for judicial review of sentences to life without parole after 25 years of imprisonment. It’s too early for a court to be applying the law just yet—the first reviews shouldn’t happen until 2019—but we’re getting close, and people are talking about it. Today’s post describes the law. Since 1994, sentences to life without parole in North Carolina are true “natural life” sentences. The sentence is fully served only upon the defendant’s death, and there is no possibility of parole. That was not the case under earlier law, where life sentences were eligible for parole after 10 or 20 years, depending on the crime for which they were imposed. With no outright release date and no parole, a defendant’s only chance of being released from a life sentence is via executive clemency. For brief time, North Carolina law provided for a judicial review of life sentences designed to steer appropriate cases toward clemency. G.S. 15A-1380.5, enacted contemporaneously with Structured Sentencing and effective for offenses committed on or after October 1, 1994, entitled a life-sentenced inmate to a judicial review of his or her sentence after 25 years of imprisonment. A resident superior court judge for the county in which the defendant was convicted performs the review. At a minimum, the judge conducting the review must consider the trial record. The judge may also review the defendant’s prison records, the position of any members of the victim’s [...]