The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in the United States has ordered a new sentencing hearing for the man convicted of the 1995 bombing of the Business Telecom Inc. building in northern Raleigh. A unanimous appellate panel agreed that the lower court judge did not follow proper procedure when re-sentencing Stephen Bullis in 2023.
While rejecting Bullis’ argument that he should not have faced any additional prison time when resentenced, the court ordered Bullis to spend almost 10 more years in prison, followed by five years of supervised release. Bullis had already served over 27 years in federal prison by the time of his resentencing.
Bullis was originally convicted in 1996 on six federal charges related to the bombing. His original sentence included 235 months for four of the charges, followed by 30 years and an additional life sentence for the other two charges.
In 2019, decisions in unrelated cases by the 4th Circuit and the U.S. Supreme Court led Bullis to seek dismissal of the last two charges. The U.S. District Judge Louise Wood Flanagan vacated the two convictions and resentenced Bullis in 2023 to a total of 450 months in prison.
However, the appellate court questioned Flanagan’s explanation of the conditions Bullis would face during supervised release after his prison term. They found discrepancies between Flanagan’s oral and written statements regarding the conditions of his release.
The case has been remanded back to Flanagan for a new sentencing hearing, with Judges Robert Bruce King and DeAndrea Gist Benjamin concurring with Judge Nicole Berner’s opinion.
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