The Maximum Duration of a Deferred Prosecution Agreement Is Three Years
Video Transcribed: What is the maximum duration of a deferred prosecution agreement in Oklahoma? I’m a Lawyer in Tulsa, James Wirth, and that’s the question that we’ve got. We’re kind of doing a few different videos on deferred prosecution agreements, and this question is how long can they last?
So this is where somebody is accused of a crime, perhaps a police report is taken down and sent to the DA for prosecution, but rather than filing charges they allow the defendant an opportunity to work a deferred prosecution agreement, where certain agreements are worked out where there are things they have to do. Could be community service.
Could be getting certain treatment. Could be paying certain restitution, whatever the case may be. They work out an agreement that keeps it out of the court system. So how long can those agreements be? What is the maximum? And it is statutory.
So it is Title 22 Section 305.1 and it notes that the maximum duration of a deferred prosecution agreement is three years. So you can only have that kind of hanging over your head for three years. If it’s filed with the court and you ultimately enter an agreement to defer sentencing, a deferred sentence, that under Oklahoma statute has a maximum of 10 years. It used to be five years.
They’ve lengthened it to 10. The benefit of that, if we’ve got crimes, financial crimes where there’s a lot of restitution, sometimes that means you want to divide up repayment of that restitution over a longer period of time.
If you can only do it over three years, that means your payments are going to be higher, maybe higher than you can handle, which may prevent a deferred prosecution for being something that could be agreed upon. But where maybe a longer-term deferred sentence, maybe something that the state would agree upon.
So that’s kind of one of the differences between deferred prosecution agreement, deferred sentence is the length of the maximum. A deferred sentence is 10 years. The maximum deferred prosecution agreement by statute is only three years.
If you are dealing with allegations of a criminal nature, you’re going to want to get to an attorney in your case more quickly so that all of your options are on the table. Once criminal charges are filed, some options do go off the table as far as a deferred prosecution agreement.
Since charges have already been filed, you’ve already dealt with that. But you’re going to want to talk to an Oklahoma attorney about your circumstances privately and confidentially. If you do want to schedule an appointment with a Tulsa Criminal Defense Attorney in my office contact me today.
