The Iowa Court of Appeals has affirmed the sentencing of a man in Crawford County District Court, four-years after he was mistakenly allowed to serve probation for a forcible felony offense. Last year, the District Court corrected the illegally lenient sentence and ordered 30-year old Christopher Jepsen to serve 10-years in prison. Jepsen was 25 when he was convicted in Aug. 2011 of two felony counts of sexual abuse in the third degree and was sentenced to serve a total of 20-years in prison, with the sentence suspended. The court then ordered Jepsen to serve 5-years of probation.

In Oct. 2014, the State filed an application to revoke Jepsen’s probation due to his admitted use of the internet to obtain pornographic images of children. While investigating the probation violation, the State noticed the illegality of Jepsen’s original sentence on Count II, where a forcible felony in the case of the 13-year old victim, is not eligible for a suspended sentence. In 2015, the State filed a motion to correct the illegal sentence and ordered an updated Pre-Sentencing Investigation (PSI).

Jepsen appealed, based on the contention the court failed to credit his corrected sentence for the time served while he was on probation, saying that the ruling violated Double Jeopardy. Because the multiple-punishment protection under the Double Jeopardy Clause turns on legislative intent, the Appeals Court examined whether Jepsen was entitled to a sentencing credit under Iowa Rule of Criminal Procedure.

Because only limited records are available in the case, the Appeals Court affirmed the corrected sentence and remanded the case back to District Court to determine whether Jepsen served any of his probationary sentence in a residential treatment facility or alternative jail facility. They acknowledged he is entitled to “full credit” for any time spent in those types of facilities but no credit for time otherwise spent under supervised probation.