A Subsequent Plead Can Be Made Concurrent to That One
Video Transcribed: Concurrent v. Consecutive Sentences in Oklahoma. I’m a criminal defense attorney Tulsa, OK, James Wirth, and we’re talking about sentencing options and the difference between them being concurrent and consecutive.
If somebody is entering a plea deal or after somebody is found guilty at a trial and they are sentenced, there could be multiple accounts in the same case and there could also be other cases involved where they have been convicted.
In the course of a plea deal, if you work out a deal with the state, you’re going to want to be very clear on whether the counts in that case or going to be consecutive or concurrent to each other and if there are other cases, whether it’s going to be consecutive or concurrent to those as well.
If the two charges are concurrent, that means whatever time has been ordered to be served on those, they are served at the same time. If you get five years on one and five years on another, those two five-year terms are served concurrently so that at the end of five years both are completely done.
That’s for simplification purposes actually, you’d get eligible for parole earlier than that, but you get the idea of what I’m saying. Whereas if they are consecutive sentences, then you have to be completed on the first sentence or at least get paroled on the first sentence before you start serving on the second sentence.
Obviously, if we have multiple counts, multiple convictions, multiple cases, whether they are concurrent or consecutive can make a huge difference on how much time that you actually spend in custody or on probation because it works for probation time as well.
If you’re entering a plea deal, you want it very clear in that plea deal, what it’s concurrent with or what it’s consecutive with so that there are no misunderstandings on that. And when the defendant has been sentenced and sent off to DOC and they’re calculating time, they can easily see that they’re concurrent so that they’re serving both those sentences at the same time.
If you have a prior case, a subsequent plead can be made concurrent to that one. Sometimes we have people that have charges in state court and the federal court trying to get those to be concurrent, which can be complicated and have to be done in a very particular way and you want to be careful about that to make sure it’s done properly.
The other thing is if you go to a jury trial and ultimately you are convicted on multiple counts, the jury will recommend a punishment but it’s the judge that actually determines that sentence, and the judge will be the one that determines whether it is concurrent or consecutively served. The jury does not make recommendations regarding that.
If you’ve got any questions regarding concurrent or subsequent sentences, you need to talk to an attorney about your specific circumstances. Just schedule that with somebody at my office. You can go online to makelaweasy.com.
