Senate Bill S6245

                                 BILL NUMBER:  S6245

 TITLE OF BILL :
An act to amend the penal law, in relation to the calculation of
concurrent indeterminate and determinate sentences

 PURPOSE :
This bill is intended to prevent defendants who are released from
State prison and are subsequently sentenced to a new State prison
sentence for a crime committed after their release, from receiving a
"windfall" of sentence credit against the new prison sentence where
that sentence and the prior "undischarged" prison sentence run
concurrently.

 SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS :
Section one of the bill amends paragraph (a) of subdivision one of
Penal Law section 70.30 to provide that, where a defendant serving a
State prison sentence is released on that sentence and is subsequently
sentenced to a State prison for a crime committed after his or her
release, if the new sentence runs concurrently with the prior
"undischarged" prison sentence, the defendant shall not receive credit
against the new prison sentence for time spent in prison on the prior
sentence.

Section two of the bill provides that the act shall take effect
immediately.
              

 JUSTIFICATION :
Under the current Penal Law provisions governing the calculation of
State prison sentences, when two or more such sentences run
concurrently with each other, all prison time served on any of the
sentences must be applied to each of the concurrent sentences.
Although this concurrent sentence credit provision makes sense in most
sentencing situations, there is at least one scenario where it can
lead to an unjustifiable "windfall" of sentence credit for certain
repeat felony offenders.

Specifically, where a defendant serving a State prison sentence is
released to parole or post-release supervision on that sentence, and
is later sentenced to State prison for a felony committed after his or
her release, if the new prison sentence runs concurrently with the
prior one, the defendant will automatically receive credit against the
new sentence for all time spent in prison on the prior sentence.  This
bill would prevent this automatic sentence credit "windfall" by
specifically providing that time spent in State prison on a prior
sentence shall not be applied against a new concurrent prison sentence
imposed for a crime committed after the defendant's release on the
prior sentence.

 LEGISLATIVE HISTORY :
This is a new bill.

 FISCAL IMPLICATIONS :
Undetermined.

 EFFECTIVE DATE :
This act shall take effect immediately.