New Hampshire v. French
Annotate this CaseDefendant Jon French appealed a superior court order that suspended his deferred sentence. In 1996, Defendant pled guilty to two counts of felonious sexual assault. Deferral of Defendant's sentence was conditioned upon his compliance "with a structured, residential program with 24 hour per day supervision." In 2010, Defendant moved to terminate his deferred sentence. The court held a hearing, at which the State presented the testimony of a clinical consultant to Defendant's treatment facility, who had been providing services to Defendant since he was in high school. The expert testified that while Defendant had the "potential" to be a danger to himself or to society "[t]he real issue here [was] his impulse to drift off that ... course of treatment, to do things that he knows that should be considered to be inappropriate." The trial court issued an order suspending Defendant's deferred sentence for a period of seven years "subject to the terms and conditions set out in the original mittimus of 1996." On appeal, Defendant argued that the trial court's decision to suspend his sentence for an additional seven years violated his right to due process. Upon review, the Supreme Court found that under the language of the 1996 sentencing order the court retained only the authority to impose or terminate Defendant's deferred sentence. Thus, the court lacked authority to suspend sua sponte Defendant's deferred sentence. The Court reversed the superior court's order and remanded the case for further proceedings.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.