[Hoot Gibson]

You said he wasn’t in sentencing phase.
He obviously was.

Obviously if he was in the sentencing phase, then he would have been sentenced. He withdrew his plea and a trial had not been docketed. The trial phase precedes the sentencing phase, which is followed by the punishment phase if there is a guilty finding. I would know that, even if I was not developing software applications for the administration of criminal justice. That is the order of events in military justice and it is the sequence of events in the civilian worlds as well.

Trials are docketed in advance but the trial phase does not commence until the judge's gavel drops and the jury or military panel is seated to hear the facts. In some cases, the defendant requests a trial by a judge only but the defendant is always entitled to a trial by jury or panel if he so elects.

Not only had the Flynn case not entered the sentencing phase, the trial phase had been postponed when he withdrew his plea. A judgment was never entered in this case. The Flynn case was in the pretrial phase.

Back to the stool in the corner. nicker: