When an offender commits a misdemeanor, the person may be required to conduct community service in lieu of imprisonment. The community service sentence is not commonly a custodial sentence and some people will commonly complete their community service sentence in noncustodial settings.
In addition to committing misdemeanor, there are also some crimes that the offenders will get for community service. If you want to know what crimes that will put you in community service work, you can dive into our post to find out real information about it. Here you go!
What Crimes Get Community Service?
It is known that a community service sentence would be specific to certain crimes, but it’s not always. To allow the offenders to get community service, the judges will often order community service for state low-level property crimes, first-time nonviolent offenders or misdemeanor. However, some judges will order community service in felony cases.
Some crimes which will put an offender in community service sentences, include:
-
- Property crimes
- Petty theft
- Shoplifting
- DUI or Driving Under the Influence
- Any certain fraud cases
It’s important to note, people with violent offenses will not get the option to participate in community service to decrease their sentence.
Furthermore, community service initially used to be only given for misdemeanor crimes, but now, more judges will order community service for felonies as well. Of course, some common crimes which can lead to community service orders are damaged property, non-grievous assault, petty theft, drunk driving, shoplifting and small-scale benefit fraud.
How Long Does Community Service Take?
According to the Crimes (Sentencing and Procedure) Act, community service requires up to 500 hours of work in the community. Of course, the type of community service that an offender has to conduct will depend on what work is available in the specific community at the time, as well as what type of work is best suited for them.
In general, an offender should complete community service hours within 12 hours. If an offender cannot complete the hours within this time frame, the extra time could be requested through the courts if there is a good reason.
Moreover, an offender will have to provide a status report of the total hours completed to that point to receive an extension. The person will be provided a new deadline and may be required to pay additional fees if the extension is approved.
The court can also issue a warrant for their arrest that can result in hail time if an offender has not requested an extension and also fails to complete their community service hours by the date set by the court. Aside from that, if an offender provides a false document that states they have completed their service when they didn’t, they may be liable to being charged with a felony.
What Are the Types of Community Service Sentences?
Community service is part of the judgement of conviction and also becomes a part of a person’s record. Here are the following types of community service sentences:
1) Condition of a sentence: This type of community service sentence applies where the offender should complete a specified number of community service hours within a specified time period.
2) Condition of probation: This type of community service sentence applies where community service hours are a condition of probation or supervised release. Then, an offender needs to complete their community service during the period of supervised release or probation.
3) Instead of time in prison or jail: This type of community service applies where an offender can get sentenced to just community service as a standalone sentence. The judge can also sentence an offender to a certain number of days in jail, while providing them the option to complete community service hours instead. However, the failure to complete community service will result in the jail time initially imposed.
4) Alternative to pay a fine: This type of community service applies where an offender cannot afford court fines and fees. Then, some jurisdictions will allow offenders to conduct community service as an alternative.
How to Serve Community Service Sentence?
It is known that the individual who is sentenced to community service can commonly do it in a wide variety of ways. The common way to conduct community service is to help out at non-profit organizations.
Aside from that, the offenders can also help government agencies and small local businesses. Need to know, the possibilities may be vast, and some sentencing judges may prefer community service related to the crime that is involved in the case. For example, in cases of a DUI or drunk driving, the judge may ask a person to speak at a school about the risks and dangers of drunk driving.
If you happen to conduct community service, you may need to choose to work at an animal or homeless shelter, speak at schools, help in road cleanup or to groups to show the dangers of the behaviour involved in the crime.
Prohibition of Conducting Community Service
Basically, community service lets people contribute to their community. Of course, the main purpose of community service is to help in their rehabilitation. On the other hand, a community service sentence can be unreasonable under the law.
There are legal limitations on how severe the community service sentence is and the courts are not allowed to impose a public service sentence which is excessive and unrelated to any crime.
Here are some prohibited community service sentences:
-
- To involve excessive amounts of hour
- To bear no relation to the crime
- Don’t leave enough time to complete the service
- Unreasonably interfere with a person’s family and work obligations
- Unreasonably interfere with a person’s other court-ordered obligations
When the individuals ask what the maximum community service sentence is, the correct answer is that sentencing judges actually have enormous discretion as to the maximum community service sentence in each case.
In this case, a community service sentence shouldn’t involve any greater deprivation of liberty than is reasonably necessary. The judge must not sentence a person to three years in prison and three years of community service if the maximum sentence for tax evasion is 5 years.
A bookworm and researcher especially related to law and citizenship education. I spend time every day in front of the internet and the campus library.
