Convicted of murder in Georgia? How long you’ll be in prison may come as a surprise
For the better part of two decades, a law has been on the books in Georgia that makes life sentences come with mandatory-minimum prison terms, ones that are perhaps longer than many today realize.
In murder cases, for instance, even if a person is sentenced to life with the possibility of parole, the person is required to serve a certain number of years before he or she becomes eligible for release.
“I would say, even right now in November of 2023, most Georgians do not know of this rule,” Macon-based defense attorney Franklin J. Hogue says.
In casual conversation people sometimes ask Hogue what kind of prison time a client of his is facing for murder.
They’ll say, “He’s gonna serve what, about five years?”
“No,” Hogue will inform them. “Thirty. Minimum.”
Which is the law: 30 years behind bars before becoming parole-eligible, even if an offender pleads guilty.
And, no, time is not shaved off for good behavior.
Prior to 2006, when new, get-tough-on-crime, life-sentencing statutes were adopted by state legislators, convictions in Georgia carried a minimum 14-year term before a life-sentenced offender’s release could be considered by the parole board. Prior to 1995 the minimum was seven years.
Retired Bibb County Superior Court Judge Howard Z. Simms says in cases involving allegations of serious felonies, where life imprisonment is a possible punishment, defendants are sometimes stunned to learn of the 30-year minimum.
“It’s a shock to a lot of people,” Simms says. “Particularly people who are young. ... They just look at you. They have no clue.”
Hogue, the defense lawyer, advises clients who are considering plea deals in murder cases to carefully weigh the stakes.
Yes, a sentence may come with the possibility of parole, but it is no guarantee of eventual freedom.
“Look at it as the rest of your natural life in prison,” Hogue says.
“The difference between life with parole and life without parole is that in the former, life with parole, the with is just a glimmer of hope,” he says.
“If that means a lot to you, to hope for a release one day, then life with the possibility of parole may be attractive to you. But if you’re saying to me, ‘It doesn’t make any difference, they’re practically the same.’ I say, ‘Well, then, let’s go to trial.”