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STATE OF NEW JERSEY VS. WILLIAM T. LIEPE (12-12-2766, ATLANTIC COUNTY AND STATEWIDE) (A-4431-14T4)

Defendant was sentenced to consecutive prison terms of twenty, seven, and five years, for first-degree aggravated manslaughter and two counts of second-degree aggravated assault, resulting from his having caused, while intoxicated, an auto accident that killed a nine-year old and seriously injured two others.

In State v. Carey, 168 N.J. 413, 429 (2001), a divided Court determined that in multiple-victim vehicular-homicide matters, sentencing judges should "ordinarily" impose "at least two consecutive terms." The Court, however, also emphasized that it had not "adopt[ed] a per se rule" and the decision to impose consecutive terms remained in the discretion of sentencing judges. Id. at 419. In considering Carey's influence here, the court remanded for resentencing because, among other things, the sentencing judge appeared to have viewed Carey as imposing a presumption in favor of consecutive terms and because the judge did not fairly consider the real-time consequence of the aggregate thirty-two year sentence, all subject to an eighty-five percent period of parole ineligibility, imposed on an offender who was fifty-eight at the time of the incident and sixty-two at the time of sentencing.