Murder of the second degree shall be punished by a definite term of imprisonment in the penitentiary which is not less than ten nor more than forty years. A person imprisoned pursuant to the provisions of this section is not eligible for parole prior to having served a minimum of ten years of his or her sentence or the minimum period required by the provisions of section thirteen, article twelve, chapter sixty-two, whichever is greater.
W. Va. Code § 61-2-3
Penalty for murder of second degree
Applied in 10 court decisions — leading case 198 W. Va. 702 - State v. Smith (1996)
Most recently applied in State of West Virginia v. Antwyn D. Gibbs and State of West Virginia v. Kevin Goodman, Jr. (March 2017)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: West Virginia Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain West Virginia statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.