Broader Sentencing Considerations
Recently, courts and legislatures have increasingly been considering military service as a mitigating factor in sentencing. In Kansas, the state legislature is considering a bill to reduce sentences for defendants who are combat veterans and have post-traumatic stress disorder. The aim is to assist returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan who become entangled in the criminal justice system to get the help they may need if they are suffering from PTSD.
In North Carolina, if a defendant was honorably discharged from the military, judges must use that fact as a mitigating factor at sentencing. And in several states, including Tennessee and Louisiana, courts have ruled that judges are allowed to use prior military service to lessen a sentence. A federal judge in Denver recently sentenced an Iraq war veteran convicted of bribery to probation instead of prison. A federal judge in Virginia rendered a shorter sentence in a child pornography case in part because the defendant suffered from PTSD after military service. In the recent capital case of Porter v. McCollum, 130 S.Ct. 447 (2009) (08-10537), the Supreme Court stated: Continue reading ›