Bear will be accepting a... OK, I don't know what you call it. A plea bargain I guess. It's not ideal, but it's probably for the best under the circumstances. He was a little confused, and I'll probably get this wrong, but basically he got 25 years. 5 in prison and 20 probation. He only has to serve 15% of his sentence in jail (don't check my math... I got the numbers from him!). When he signs the acceptance/ agreement next month, he'll have been in jail about 7 months. He says because of his good behavior that counts double so he'll have technically already served over a year of his sentence. He thinks that means he only needs to serve about 9 months total.
When he signs the acceptance, he'll go through a medical intake at a hospital for 1-2 weeks (apparently all new inmates go through this). At which point he'll finally receive a psychological evaluation and we assume get put on meds. Depending on how fast the system moves, when the eval is done, he'll have been in the system for about 8 months. Since he only needs to serve about 9 months, he and the system will have a choice at this point.
- If it's only a couple of weeks until his time is up, they might just release him and add the missing time to his probation.
- He can serve the remainder of the 9 months in prison.
- He can go to boot camp, which is 6 months long, and the "extra" time will be reduced from his probation.
He's vacillating between completing the time in prison and getting it over with, and going to boot camp. He thinks boot camp might look better than hard time (not sure to whom), but at the same time he's worried that he might get into trouble at boot camp (which is young adult offenders).
When he gets out he believes he'll be able to transfer his probation to another state, and he plans to go "home." I had to ask him where home was. I'll be honest, it hurt a little to have to ask. Home is with his bio grandmother in Nebraska. I'm OK with that.
I did mention he might want to think about going to boot camp so he'd have more time to get stable on his meds before he goes to live with family, so he doesn't damage his relationship with them. At that point in the conversation he was saying he didn't want to go to boot camp. Maybe that will change down the road. I think he'd benefit from the extra activity and extra time to get stable, but I can't make him.
I hope it works out the way he wants it to. I'm really glad he'll be getting medical treatment soon. After he's released, "someone" will help him get signed up for SSI benefits, and it sounds like he'll be willing to try to get therapy and plans to stay on his meds.
3 comments:
Hi Mary! It sounds like he is on a better track than he was or could have been. I'm sorry he has decided home is not with you. But it doesn't sound like he is sure either. I hope that he is able to get on meds and sticks to them. I hope his experience has positive lasting affects in his decisions. Did his plea bargain include pleasing guilty to a lesser charge? It would be great if it isn't a felony still. He has enough barriers... As always, wishing you the best.
RADMom - Yes, his plea bargain is a lesser charge, but it went from a first degree felony to a second degree felony so it's still a felony.
As for the "home" thing, we're still here when this doesn't work, and honestly he's not really in a place where ANYthing will work long term. So this is probably for the best.
Thanks for the good wishes!
Mary
What he is talking about is called Good-time. It varies from state to state.Its not a sure thing that inmates will get good-time credit so stress to him that his behavior counts towards him getting out sooner. Oklahoma, where up to 44 days of credit per
month may be awarded to select inmates,
considering all areas of institutional life,
including work attendance and program
participation;
I hope everything works out for him, if seems that for some life is so easy and for others it his such a struggle. Good luck to him.
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