In law, a sentence is the

punishment Punishment, commonly, is the imposition of an undesirable or unpleasant outcome upon a group or individual, meted out by an authority—in contexts ranging from child discipline to criminal law—as a response and deterrent to a particular acti ...

for a crime ordered by a trial court after conviction in a

criminal procedure Criminal procedure is the adjudication process of the criminal law. While criminal procedure differs dramatically by jurisdiction, the process generally begins with a formal criminal charge with the person on trial either being free on bail or ...

, normally at the conclusion of a trial. A sentence may consist of

imprisonment Imprisonment is the restraint of a person's liberty, for any cause whatsoever, whether by authority of the government, or by a person acting without such authority. In the latter case it is "false imprisonment". Imprisonment does not necessari ...

, a

fine Fine may refer to: Characters * Sylvia Fine (''The Nanny''), Fran's mother on ''The Nanny'' * Officer Fine, a character in ''Tales from the Crypt'', played by Vincent Spano Legal terms * Fine (penalty), money to be paid as punishment for an offe ...

, or other sanctions. Sentences for multiple crimes may be a concurrent sentence, where sentences of imprisonment are all served together at the same time, or a consecutive sentence, in which the period of imprisonment is the sum of all sentences served one after the other. Additional sentences include intermediate, which allows an inmate to be free for about 8 hours a day for work purposes; determinate, which is fixed on a number of days, months, or years; and indeterminate or bifurcated, which mandates the minimum period be served in an institutional setting such as a prison followed by street time period of parole,

supervised release Parole (also known as provisional release or supervised release) is a form of early release of a prison inmate where the prisoner agrees to abide by certain behavioral conditions, including checking-in with their designated parole officers, or ...

or probation until the total sentence is completed. If a sentence is reduced to a less harsh punishment, then the sentence is said to have been mitigated or commuted. Rarely depending on circumstances,

murder Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification (jurisprudence), justification or valid excuse (legal), excuse, especially the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. ("The killing of another person wit ...

charges are mitigated and reduced to

manslaughter Manslaughter is a common law legal term for homicide considered by law as less culpable than murder. The distinction between murder and manslaughter is sometimes said to have first been made by the ancient Athenian lawmaker Draco in the 7th cen ...

charges. However, in certain legal systems, a defendant may be punished beyond the terms of the sentence, through phenomena including social stigma, loss of governmental benefits, or collectively, the

collateral consequences of criminal charges Collateral consequences of criminal conviction are the additional civil state penalties, mandated by statute, that attach to a criminal conviction. They are not part of the direct consequences of criminal conviction, such as prison, fines, or pro ...

Statute A statute is a formal written enactment of a legislative authority that governs the legal entities of a city, state, or country by way of consent. Typically, statutes command or prohibit something, or declare policy. Statutes are rules made by le ...

s generally specify the highest penalties that may be imposed for certain offenses, and sentencing guidelines often mandate the minimum and maximum imprisonment terms to imposed upon an offender, which is then left to the discretion of the trial court.See, e.g., ''United States v. Valencia-Mendoza'', ___ F.3d ___, ___
No. 17-30158
p.20-21 & n.4 (9th Cir. Jan. 10, 2019) (stating that courts of appeals "have held that, when determining whether a tateoffense is 'punishable' by more than one year in prison, the

Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

's recent cases require an examination of the maximum sentence possible under the state's mandatory sentencing guidelines."); see also ''Matter of Cota''
23 I&N Dec. 849
852 ( BIA 2005). However, in some jurisdictions, prosecutors have great influence over the punishments actually handed down, by virtue of their discretion to decide what offenses to charge the offender with and what facts they will seek to prove or to ask the defendant to stipulate to in a

plea agreement A plea bargain (also plea agreement or plea deal) is an agreement in criminal law proceedings, whereby the prosecutor provides a concession to the defendant in exchange for a plea of guilt or '' nolo contendere.'' This may mean that the defendan ...

. It has been argued that legislators have an incentive to enact tougher sentences than even they would like to see applied to the typical defendant since they recognize that the blame for an inadequate sentencing range to handle a particularly egregious crime would fall upon legislators, but the blame for excessive punishments would fall upon prosecutors. Sentencing law sometimes includes cliffs that result in much stiffer penalties when certain facts apply. For instance, an

armed career criminal The Armed Career Criminal Act of 1984 (ACCA) is a United States federal law that provides sentence enhancements for felons who commit crimes with firearms if they are convicted of certain crimes three or more times. If a felon has three or more ...

or habitual offender law may subject a defendant to a significant increase in his sentence if he commits a third offence of a certain kind. This makes it difficult for fine gradations in punishments to be achieved.

History

The earliest use of the term with this meaning was in Roman law, where it indicated the opinion of a

jurist A jurist is a person with expert knowledge of law; someone who analyses and comments on law. This person is usually a specialist legal scholar, mostly (but not always) with a formal qualification in law and often a legal practitioner. In the Uni ...

on a given question, expressed in written or in oral ''responsa''. It might also refer to the opinion of senators that was translated into the ''senatus consultus''. Finally, it might also refer to the decision of the bench in both civil and penal trials, as well as the decision of the ''Arbiters'' in

arbitration Arbitration is a form of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) that resolves disputes outside the judiciary courts. The dispute will be decided by one or more persons (the 'arbitrators', 'arbiters' or 'arbitral tribunal'), which renders the ' ...

. In modern Latin systems, the sentence is mainly the final act of any procedure in which a judge or body of judges is called upon to express their evaluation. It can therefore be issued in practically any field of law requiring a function of evaluation of something by a judge or judging body.

Classification

Sentences are variously classified depending on *the legal field, or kind of action, or system it refers to: **civil, penal, administrative, canon, sentence. **sentences of mere clearance, of condemnation, of constitution. *the issuing body, typically a monocratic judge or a court, or other figures that receive a legitimation by the system. *the jurisdiction and the legal competence single judges, courts, tribunals, appeals, supreme courts, constitutional courts, meant as the various degrees of judgement and appeal. *the content: **partial, cautelar, interlocutory, preliminar ''sententia instructoria'', definitive sentences. **sentence of ''absolutio'' discharge or ''condemnatio'' briefly ''damnatio'', also for other meanings condemnation. The sentences of condemnation are also classified by the penalty they determine: ***sentence of reclusion, ***sentence of fee, ***''sententia agendi'', sentence that impose a determined action or a series of action as a penalty for the illegal act. This kind of sentence became better developed and remained in wider use in common law systems.

Philosophies

The sentence meted out depends on the philosophical principle used by the court and what the legal system regards as the purpose of punishment. The most common purposes of sentencing are: *

Retribution Retribution may refer to: * Punishment * Retributive justice, a theory of justice ** Divine retribution, retributive justice in a religious context * Revenge, a harmful action against a person or group in response to a grievance Film and televis ...

* Deterrence of the individual or of others *

Denunciation Denunciation (from Latin ''denuntiare'', "to denounce") is the act of publicly assigning to a person the blame for a perceived wrongdoing, with the hope of bringing attention to it. Notably, centralized social control in authoritarian states re ...

* Incapacitation *

Rehabilitation Rehabilitation or Rehab may refer to: Health * Rehabilitation (neuropsychology), therapy to regain or improve neurocognitive function that has been lost or diminished * Rehabilitation (wildlife), treatment of injured wildlife so they can be retur ...

* Reparation In England and Wales, section 142 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 has specified that in cases involving those over 18, courts should have regard to punishment of the offenders retribution, deterrence, reform and rehabilitation, protection of the public, and reparation to persons affected by their offences.

Process

Usually, the sentence comes at the end of a process in which the presiding judge or judges have been enabled to evaluate whether the conduct in question complies or does not comply with the law, and which aspects might be breaches of which specific legislation. Depending on jurisdiction, the stages leading up to the sentence may vary, and the sentence may be challenged by both parties up to a given degree of

appeal In law, an appeal is the process in which cases are reviewed by a higher authority, where parties request a formal change to an official decision. Appeals function both as a process for error correction as well as a process of clarifying and ...

. If appealed against, the sentence issued by the highest appellate court to which the case is admitted becomes the definitive sentence. The sentence usually has to be publicly announced; and, in most jurisdictions, has to be justified through an explanation of the juridical reflections and evaluations that lie behind it. Even a definitive sentence can be annulled in exceptional circumstances, usually predetermined within the jurisdiction in question. Most such cases arise from irregularities found in the judicial process after sentence has been passed. The most extreme examples arise in criminal cases, when conclusive proof of innocence comes to light after sentence has been passed, leading to the sentence's annulment. In most jurisdictions, under double jeopardy legislation, the definitive sentence is unique, in the sense that (with the exception of appeal hearings) no individual can be judged or sentenced more than once for the same actions. In many jurisdictions, sentences are a source of law, in that they represent an authoritative interpretation of the law in concrete cases. The sentence is typically determined by a judge and/or jury, and is issued in the name or on behalf of the superior authority of the state.

References

External links

Sentencing (Directgov, England and Wales)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sentence (Law)