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AREA JUDGES SOFTEN SENTENCES

Newsleader.com

December 23, 2011

STAUNTON — Judges in the southern Shenandoah Valley are more inclined to set milder sentences than Virginia judges generally, the latest annual review by the Virginia Criminal Sentencing Commission shows.

The judges in the 25th Circuit, which stretches from Augusta County south to Craig County and includes Staunton and Waynesboro, mitigate 15 percent of sentences, compared to a state average of 11 percent. The result is a sentence less-stiff than state guidelines suggest.

Area judges also are less inclined to find aggravating factors to give harsher sentences than state guidelines recommend, doing so in 8 percent of cases, compared to the state average of 10 percent.

But the commission report also shows that judges in the 25th are tougher than average on many of the most violent crimes.

Judges here give sterner sentences than the guidelines suggest in 43 percent of homicides, well above the state average of less than 28 percent.

In cases of robbery, which police say is one of the most dangerous crimes because the physical threat involved can so easily result in injury or worse, judges in the 25th Circuit find aggravating factors in 12.5 percent of cases, compared to the state average of 10 percent. Judges here are tougher on burglary, too.

On the other hand, judges in the 25th Circuit are more inclined to mitigate drug cases and rape cases, the data show.

"The judges us here look at all the facts and circumstances, and they're not just going to rubber stamp the guidelines," said Waynesboro lawyer Thomas B. Weidner IV, who has practiced as a prosecutor and a defense attorney.

"They are not afraid to do what is right in their hearts," he said.