California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from People v. Montalvo, E044720 (Cal. App. 11/21/2008), E044720 (Cal. App. 2008):
To encourage the "careful exercise of discretion" and to decrease "the risk of error," trial courts are required to orally articulate their reasons for discretionary sentencing choices on the record. (People v. Scott (1994) 9 Cal.4th 331, 351.) "In order to encourage prompt detection and correction of error, and to reduce the number of unnecessary appellate claims, reviewing courts have required parties to raise certain issues at the time of sentencing. In such cases, lack of a timely and meaningful objection forfeits or waives the claim." (Ibid.) This forfeiture rule applies to claims involving the trial court's failure to state or give sufficient reasons for discretionary sentencing choices. (Id. at p. 353.)
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