By District Attorney Ryan Sayers
2023 Vol. 46
Last week, I started to explain some of the upcoming changes to the Sentencing Guidelines in Pennsylvania that will take effect on Jan. 1, 2024.
The biggest changes, which were discussed last week, will be to the Sentencing Matrix and ranges of sentences.
However, that is not the only major change that will occur with the new Pennsylvania Sentencing Guidelines. When calculating Prior Record Scores in 2024, defendants will get the benefit of ‘lapsing’.
This new ‘lapsing provision’ removes certain older offenses from consideration when calculating a Prior Record Score for a new offense. However, a defendant only gets the benefit of this if he/she has been crime-free for a certain period of time. If a defendant has a crime of violence on his/her record (i.e. aggravated assault cause serious bodily injury) and that person has been crime-free for 25 years or more, then that crime would not be considered in his/her calculation.
For serious crimes, felony 3’s, and unclassified felonies (i.e. burglary, theft of a motor vehicle, possession with the intent to deliver), it is a 15 year crime-free period. Misdemeanors the crime-free period is 10 years in order to qualify for lapsing.
While this was concerning to prosecutors around the Commonwealth when initially proposed, it is believed that few defendants that find themselves back in court will actually qualify for this lapsing provision.
In thinking through cases in Clearfield County that we have handled in the last four years, there are very few defendants that have been crime-free for at least 10 years when they reoffended.
Many defendants we see in the system tend to be recidivists, especially if the crimes are drug or drug related offenses (which are the vast majority of the crimes in Clearfield County).
So while this lapsing provision is an incentive for defendants to stay out of the criminal justice system, I would expect few defendants will be able to take advantage of it.
Next week, I will move on to one of the last topics before the end of the year—recusals and conflicts.
If you have any questions that you would like answered in this weekly article before the end of the year, please feel free to e-mail me at districtattorney@clearfieldco.org.
Ryan Sayers is the elected District Attorney of Clearfield County, Pennsylvania. The information contained in this article is provided for informational and educational purposes only, and should not be construed as legal advice on any subject matter.
You should not act or refrain from acting on the basis of any content included in this article without seeking legal or other professional advice.
The contents of these articles contain general information and may not reflect current legal developments or address your situation.
