New Pennsylvania Supreme Court Decision Signals a Return to Normalcy in DUI Sentencing
Recently, I indicated in a blog that a recent decision of the PA Supreme Court "altered" the sentencing scheme for DUI cases. This is not quite correct. What the Court did was to return things to the way they had been prior to 2007. The recent decision can more accurately be described as a return to normalcy.
DUI offenders in Pennsylvania are subject to more severe sentences if they had prior offenses at the time they committed their current offense. Up until around 2007, the term "prior offenses" meant prior DUI convictions that occurred before the defendant committed the current offense. Thus, if a driver gets arrested for DUI#1 and gets arrested for DUI#2 a week later, they are both sentenced as first offenses because at the time of the DUI#2 arrest, the driver had not yet been convicted of DUI#1.
Although it may not seem to make sense that someone can commit two separate offenses and both are considered to be first offenses, there is a reason behind it. It is known as the "recidivist philosophy." A recidivist is someone who violates the law; is prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced; and then violates the law again. A person who commits a second offense before he is convicted on the first offense is not really a recidivist. Because he has not yet been convicted and sentenced, he has not yet received the benefit of "notice" from the courts of the criminality of his conduct. Nor has he experienced the deterring effects of the punishment he would have received. To put it simply, a recidivist has been apprehended and punished once already. He then committed a second crime, so the punishment was obviously not enough to deter him from more criminal conduct, Therefore, a stronger punishment is in order for the second offense. On the other hand, a person who has committed two offenses and has not yet been punished for either offense might be effectively deterred without increasing the level of punishment.
Hence, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s decision in Commonwealth v. Haag:
- "Thus, for purposes of applying the recidivist sentencing provisions of the DUI statute, when presented with two or more Section 3802 DUI violations, a sentencing court must first ascertain whether conviction on the first violation occurred before the offender committed the subsequent offense. If no conviction on that previous violation had occurred by the time the offender committed the subsequent violation, pursuant to Section 3806(b), the offender cannot be sentenced as a recidivist on the subsequent violation."
Read the entire decision here: http://www.aopc.org/OpPosting/Supreme/out/J-41-2009mo.pdf
If you have been accused of a Pennsylvania DUI, contact Pennsylvania DUI Attorney, Richard J. Emhof today at 1-866-457-9957 to discuss your case. The initial consultation is free of charge.
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