State v. Baptist
Annotate this CasePhillip Baptist pleaded no contest to the off-grid crime of rape of a child under the age of fourteen. The district court imposed a hard twenty-five life sentence under Jessica's Law, meaning Baptist would only be eligible for parole after serving twenty-five years in prison, and also imposed lifetime postrelease supervision. The Supreme Court affirmed in part and vacated in part the sentence, holding (1) the statutory provision providing for a hard twenty-five life sentence is the only provision that applies when a defendant is sentenced under Jessica's law, and therefore, the district court did not err in sentencing Baptist to a hard twenty-five life sentence; (2) a defendant sentenced under Jessica's Law is subject to lifetime parole rather than lifetime postrelease supervision, and therefore, the district court erred in sentencing Baptist to lifetime postrelease supervision; and (3) the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying Baptist's motion to depart from the sentence provided for in Jessica's Law because reasonable people could have agreed that the aggravating circumstances of the crime outweighed the mitigating factor. Remanded.
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