BILL NUMBER: S10443
SPONSOR: MYRIE
 
TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the criminal procedure law, in relation to broadening
the court's discretion to use extended terms of interim probation on
consent of the defendant to avoid incarceratory outcomes
2.  
SOURCE OF BILL
This bill is being introduced at the request of the Unified Court
System, on the recommendation of the Chief Administrative Judge's Advi-
sory Committee on Criminal Law and Procedure.
3.  
PURPOSE OF BILL
This bill would amend section 390.30(6) of the Criminal Procedure Law
allow courts broader discretion to use extended terms of interim
probation on the consent of the defendant to avoid carceral outcomes.
4.  
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS
Section 1 of the bill amends CPL 390.30 to allow the court to impose up
to three years of interim probation on the consent of the defendant and
after consultation with the prosecutor. The amendments also broaden the
applicability of the provision to defendants who are participating in
treatment in connection with any type of problem-solving court, as well
as defendants who have been subject to interim probation imposed by any
court as part of a conditional plea agreement.
Section 2 of the bill sets the effective date at sixty days after the
bill becomes law.
5.  
JUSTIFICATION
Interim probation is a court-ordered trial period of monitoring, where a
convicted person lives in the community under the supervision of the
local probation department before final sentencing. Courts have used
this as a tool to support such justice-involved individuals as they
undergo treatment, especially in areas that lack established non-govern-
mental partners who could otherwise coordinate treatment.
Under current law, interim probation may initially be imposed for up to
one year from the date of the conviction and may be extended only for
one additional year where the defendant consents and is participating in
a treatment program in connection with a designated treatment court. At
that point, sentence must be imposed. Interim probation is typically
utilized by diversion courts in cases where the defendant has entered
into a conditional plea agreement, but for the most challenging of those
cases, one or two years may not provide enough time for a defendant to
successfully achieve all that is required under the court's mandate.
Treatment-court pleas, for example, often involve setbacks. The avail-
ability of longer terms of interim probation will provide courts with
greater flexibility in avoiding imposition of a harsher often carceral
agreed-upon alternative sentence.
In addition, broadening the applicability of the current provision to
defendants who are in treatment in connection with any court under a
conditional plea agreement instead of only officially designated treat-
ment courts would allow more "problem-solving mode" resolutions to
matters that are not being handled by traditional mental health or
substance use parts, which is consistent with the UCS's overall vision
for our criminal courts.
A recent example of how this bill could be effectively utilized if it
were enacted occurred in a case where the court wished to use interim
probation in felony matters as part of conditional plea agreements. The
district attorney's office was open to the idea but wanted the defendant
to serve more than one year of interim probation, which is not possible
under current law (because the court in this example was not a treatment
court). This proposal would support this collaborative, problem-solving
approach, which could keep defendants out of jail and avoid felony
convictions while simultaneously promoting public safety by allowing
extended supervision.
6.  
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY
This is a new bill.
7.  
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS
This bill would have no fiscal impact on the State. Even were there to
be some upfront marginal increased costs borne by localities for an
extended period of probation and treatment, avoiding incarceratory
outcomes overtime would likely more than recoup such expenses overall.
8.  
EFFECTIVE DATE
This bill will become effective sixty days after becoming law.

Statutes affected:
S10443: 390.30 criminal procedure law, 390.30(6) criminal procedure law