14 ms·

One thing I would love to see taken off is plea deals. It's abused often, "plead guilt and do 2 yrs take a chance that if you lose we will give you the maximu

One thing I would love to see taken off is plea deals. It's abused often, "plead guilt and do 2 yrs take a chance that if you lose we will give you the maximum 20 yrs" If someone deserves 20 yrs, then they don't deserve 2 yrs no matter the cooperation. If someone deserves 2 yrs, they don't deserve 20 yrs. Time served should be all about serious of crime and how long we think it would take to rehabilitate the person. It's all fucking games.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
bena 8y ago
I think it's something about remorse. Maintaining innocence when you know you're guilty shows a lack of remorse about what you've done. Admitting what you did and that you did it shows you at least know it's wrong and that you deserve some punishment. Also those deals come with stipulations and caveats. Sometimes, turning evidence is done in exchange for lighter sentences. Being able to prosecute and jail a worse criminal in exchange for letting off a lesser one. Or there's reoffending clauses. Less jail time but if they reoffend in a certain period, they have to serve the full sentence. Also, you say it should be about how long it would take to rehabilitate a person, that's different for every person. In a crime of passion, where someone accidentally kills someone else, should any jail time be given? It requires a certain set of circumstances. A set that may never be repeated again.
- bilbo0s 8y ago
  "...I think it's something about remorse. Maintaining innocence when you know you're guilty shows a lack of remorse..." Mmm... just, Devil's Advocate. What if the defendant is maintaining innocence because they are innocent?
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    Perhaps a rephrase which solves your objection: “Maintaining innocence when you know the State has decided you are guilty shows a lack of willingness to subordinate yourself to the State.”
- scarface74 8y ago
  The prosecution has the full backing of the state and for all intents and purposes has an unlimited budget. The accused often is stuck with an overworked public defender. The odds are against anyone whether innocent or guilty once you’ve been arrested. There have been plenty of instances of dirty cops get caught planting evidence on camera, prosecutors withholding evidence, and striking people of color from juries because they thought they were less likely to convict and (rightfully) who are less trusting of police. Taking all that into account, a known lighter sentence makes more sense than an unknown heavier sentence.
  - gregmac 8y ago
    Interesting Twitter thread about why this happens: https://mobile.twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/1021187217664995328 https://mobile.twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/1021187217664...
  - ams6110 8y ago
    But they don't have an unlimited budget. There are a certain number of prosecutors working for the county and they all have a certain number of hours in the work week. There is a limit to what they can do. They will not bring a case to trial if they don't feel they have a good chance of conviction. And they will offer pleas deals to reduce their workload. They're not going to waste time on a marginal case.
    - scarface74 8y ago
      A plea bargain and the ability to threaten the accused with long prison sentence means they can get convictions for marginal cases.
    - gowld 8y ago
      What's wrong with our laws and our country if we have so many criminals that we can't afford to prosecute them? We should fix that problem instead of papering over it.
      - scarface74 8y ago
- fake-name 8y ago
  > I think it's something about remorse. Maintaining innocence when you know you're guilty shows a lack of remorse about what you've done. Admitting what you did and that you did it shows you at least know it's wrong and that you deserve some punishment. Yeah, but that hinges entirely under the assumption that the accused is guilty. What if they're legitimately not?
  - fastball 8y ago
    Then they still have more options? The existence of plea bargains does not make you more likely to get convicted of a crime you didn't commit if you are pleading innocent.
    - ctjackso 8y ago
      But it's literally a heavily studied question in decision theory, and there are tons of statistics that people are too scared by the potential consequences to fight for their own right, when they know they're innocent. Sure, if you are pleading innocent there's potentially no or a lower effect - but the probability of a defendant pleading innocent is _significantly_ impacted by the existence of plea bargains.
    - ergothus 8y ago
      The problem is the unknowns. Let's say you are wrongly charged with a crime and the evidence is enough that the prosecution is moving forward. The max sentence is 30 years, and you're offered a plea of 2 years. There is a chance the system will utterly fail you, and a chance that the system will correctly find you innocent. You don't know those odds. You only know your fears. And the prosecution has a LOT of tools to raise those fears. Society has given you LOTS of reasons to trust those fears. But one thing you won't have is security that your innocence means you will not be found guilty. 2 years is a major problem, but...marriages have survived that. You'll be around to see your kids/nieces/nephews hit most of their major life milestones, and more importantly, a lot of day-to-day normality of what you call life. 30 years...your life has ended. Every relationship is over, every daily experience, everything you define as you. You have a LOT on the line, and the system...enh, it has very little on the line. What odds of failure of the system do you find worth the risk? If anyone takes a plea deal when they are innocent, they may very well be saving themselves some real pain. Or they may be needlessly damning themselves to life as a (ex)con. We don't know. But that it seems a viable option EVEN WHEN INNOCENT is definitely a problem. Making the system more reliable should definitely happen, but that won't remove the imbalance of incentives.
- ergothus 8y ago
  > Maintaining innocence when you know you're guilty shows a lack of remorse about what you've done. Yet pleading guilty only because you get a payoff for it doesn't really say anything about your remorse either. Not attacking you or your position (whatever that may be) - I know you're just explaining the reason we have this system, but it's also worth pointing out that said rationale isn't uncontested.
- gowld 8y ago
  > you say it should be about how long it would take to rehabilitate a person, that's different for every person. This is why parole hearings exist. You don't need to decide the number in advance.
  - bena 8y ago
    That is if you aren't jailed without chance for a parole until X years. Do you really think there's a minimum number of years to rehabilitate someone from theft? Vandalism? Murder? If you believe it's solely about how long it takes to rehabilitate people, then sentencing shouldn't exist. Prisons should be run drastically different. And records shouldn't be made public because one of the main causes of recidivism is the stigma you get from being a felon.
lordnacho 8y ago
Yeah I always thought this was weird. I haven't had much contact with the actual criminal system, but the way it's portrayed in popular culture makes it look all wrong. Can it really be that you can trade punishment for efficiency (of the legal system)? Is that really why you're allowed to do that? It seems like a terrible time for people to be playing poker, yet that's what it looks like. One interesting twist is helping the prosecution. If you turn in a fellow bad guy, by giving evidence that helps put him away, should you be allowed to trade in your own punishment for his? Presumably the same argument applies, right? Whatever you did was just as wrong, why should you get anything different? But you need some incentive...
pointytrees 8y ago
Another unfortunate factor is.... if you take the plea for 2, case closed. If you don't take the plea, then that makes a lot more work for everyone involved (justice department) to take it to trial.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
pvg 8y ago
Can you think of any practitioner or other serious critic of the US justice system who thinks the fundamental problem is plea deals? They always seem to be trotted out in these discussions as somehow obviously bad and unfair on the level of, say, abusive civil forfeiture. But the objection you are describing is the difference between a possible, usually highly unlikely maximum sentence and a sentence arrived at in a plea deal. Only one of those is a real thing, though.
- AnthonyMouse 8y ago
  > But the objection you are describing is the difference between a possible, usually highly unlikely maximum sentence and a sentence arrived at in a plea deal. Only one of those is a real thing, though. The maximum penalty does actually happen though, it's just not common. The problem is that you don't know if it will happen to you before the trial, so its existence is extremely coercive. It scares the crap out of people -- and people are risk averse. They'll take a 100% chance of 2 years over a 1% chance of 30 years, even if the expected value is lower, because on the off chance the coin comes up tails six times in a row, they lose their entire life.
  - pvg 8y ago
    That's not a particularly important detail of my question.
- mikeash 8y ago
  It may not be the fundamental problem, but plea deals are still horribly unjust. They are punishment for asserting your rights. They should never have been allowed and should be abolished.
  - pvg 8y ago
    Ok, you feel strongly about plea deals but I still don't understand what the theory of supposed injustice is supposed to be. Why aren't people like Ken White railing against plea deals? Or maybe some are? Etc.
kimdotcom 8y ago
Agreed. I don't see how justice and bargains are compatible.
csa 8y ago
According to my defense attorney friend, a 2 plea and 20 trial offer means a few things: - It’s considered a 2-year crime. - The 20 (that seemed high to him for a 2 year plea) is a fuck you for going to trial when you are almost undoubtedly guilty. As someone else mentioned, it seems to show a lack of remorse. - Note that both sentences will probably have time off for good behavior as well as possible probation. This can make each of the sentences less daunting (e.g., “2 years” might end up as 6 months served and 1.5 years probation). - Cooperating is a totally different issue. They use that to get a bigger fish (usually).
- intralizee 8y ago
  Oh please.., tell me nobody serious actually believes this nonsense. People go to prison and while innocent of all crimes accused. That attitude of certainty in any situation should bar a person from a career in the justice system.
  - csa 8y ago
    While I agree that innocent people do go to jail sometimes, I think this is much rarer than you make it out to be. The instances I have heard of it, either the system was (or one or more actors in that system were) corrupt, or the defendant had incompetent counsel.
    - intralizee 8y ago
      How did I make it out to be? Also how do you respond, "this is much rare than you make it out to be" from reading my comment. (Assumptions) while attempting to justify madness is a scapegoat at best from changing ones view; from understanding the human error of the poor process. Now I have no way to know the frequency if it's rare or common. Unrelated to my past comment, I don't believe in free will and think the whole justice system is madness.
    - carlmr 8y ago
      https://www.innocenceproject.org/how-many-innocent-people-are-in-prison/ https://www.innocenceproject.org/how-many-innocent-people-ar... The current estimate is roughly 1%. Sending someone to prison is basically taking some or all of their life. We currently have an estimated 20,000 innocent people in jail. That's not rare, and it's disgusting that this complete ethical failure of the American justice system is defended here.
gsnedders 8y ago
I live somewhere (Scotland) where there are no plea bargains. The whole concept seems bizarre to me, essentially negotiating punishment (especially having the prosecution involved in deciding the punishment).
- tzs 8y ago
  Scotland seems to have negotiated mechanisms that are similar to plea bargaining. It appears that prosecutors can make deals with defendants to replace more serious charges with less serious charges, which carry less jail time, if the defendants agree to plead guilty to those charges. Scotland also appears to give a substantial sentence reduction for defendants who plead guilty early. "PLEA AND CONFESSION BARGAINING IN SCOTLAND" [1] "Tensions and balances, costs and rewards: the sentence discount in Scotland" [2] "Furious 'stalking' victim slams courts for striking plea bargain with man who 'made her life a misery'" [3] [1] https://www.ejcl.org/103/abs103-8.html https://www.ejcl.org/103/abs103-8.html [2] https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/1422462.pdf https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/1422462.pdf [3] https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/crown-office-admits-striking-deal-12289201 https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/crown-offic...
- wahern 8y ago
  Scotland absolutely has plea bargains, and it's quite prevalent. The distinction with the U.S. system is that the judge is not as involved in the negotiations.[1] The process of charge and fact bargaining is entirely dependent on informal negotiations between the prosecution and the defence. There is no involvement on the part of the judge. Scotland does not operate a system of American-style sentence bargaining. This means that the prosecution cannot guarantee to the accused that a particular sentence will result if he pleads guilty (unless the bargain means that the court’s sentencing powers are reduced because, for example, the offence to which the accused eventually pleads guilty has a maximum sentence). (https://www.ejcl.org/103/art103-8.pdf https://www.ejcl.org/103/art103-8.pdf) Also, IIUC in Scotland the prosecutor can often impose civil fines and other remedies in lieu of prosecution and do so completely independently of a court. Whereas in the U.S. such arrangements are less often in lieu of prosecution; rather they're terms of an actual conviction and still involve a court formalizing things. Really it seems the difference between the Scottish and U.S. system is largely semantics, and of course the fact that the criminal justice system in the U.S. is just plain harsh. Our harsher penalties compounded by charge stacking effectively gives courts huge leeway in terms of sentencing. Nobody would agree to plea for a small penalty if a court could unilaterally impose the harshest option. Combined with our constitutional law that all but prohibits a prosecutor from imposing penalties unilaterally (voluntarily or not), and it's clear why our plea bargaining process involves the judge and so-called sentence bargaining more so than in other similar systems. [1] Or rather, the court gives little or no weight to the terms of the "contract" between the defendant and prosecutor, which can increase the risk for the defendant. Whereas in the U.S. the court has much less discretion to ignore the terms of a plea bargain, and in addition the judge will often mediate, which of course all but guarantees his imprimatur. Therefore there's less risk for a defendant and he will be more likely to take a plea deal.
everdev 8y ago
I wonder how much time and money is saved by plea deals. No plea deals or minimal plea deals would be an incentive to go to trial even if the evidence is overwhelming as you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. I think you see this in high profile murder cases because the plea deal is usually life in prison, which is not much of a bargain for most people so they might a well roll the dice like OJ did and hope the prosecution screws up. I think they're drastically different from the trial punishment for a reason.
washadjeffmad 8y ago
I'd remove pleading as well. Why should we gamify trial outcomes by forcing the accused to place a bet against what a judge or jury will decide when it should be based on the evidence? If evidence to convict is not sufficient or present, why do we require a conviction?

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

bena 8y ago

I think it's something about remorse. Maintaining innocence when you know you're guilty shows a lack of remorse about what you've done. Admitting what you did and that you did it shows you at least know it's wrong and that you deserve some punishment. Also those deals come with stipulations and caveats. Sometimes, turning evidence is done in exchange for lighter sentences. Being able to prosecute and jail a worse criminal in exchange for letting off a lesser one. Or there's reoffending clauses. Less jail time but if they reoffend in a certain period, they have to serve the full sentence. Also, you say it should be about how long it would take to rehabilitate a person, that's different for every person. In a crime of passion, where someone accidentally kills someone else, should any jail time be given? It requires a certain set of circumstances. A set that may never be repeated again.

bilbo0s 8y ago
"...I think it's something about remorse. Maintaining innocence when you know you're guilty shows a lack of remorse..." Mmm... just, Devil's Advocate. What if the defendant is maintaining innocence because they are innocent?
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  Perhaps a rephrase which solves your objection: “Maintaining innocence when you know the State has decided you are guilty shows a lack of willingness to subordinate yourself to the State.”
scarface74 8y ago
The prosecution has the full backing of the state and for all intents and purposes has an unlimited budget. The accused often is stuck with an overworked public defender. The odds are against anyone whether innocent or guilty once you’ve been arrested. There have been plenty of instances of dirty cops get caught planting evidence on camera, prosecutors withholding evidence, and striking people of color from juries because they thought they were less likely to convict and (rightfully) who are less trusting of police. Taking all that into account, a known lighter sentence makes more sense than an unknown heavier sentence.
- gregmac 8y ago
  Interesting Twitter thread about why this happens: https://mobile.twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/1021187217664995328 https://mobile.twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/1021187217664...
- ams6110 8y ago
  But they don't have an unlimited budget. There are a certain number of prosecutors working for the county and they all have a certain number of hours in the work week. There is a limit to what they can do. They will not bring a case to trial if they don't feel they have a good chance of conviction. And they will offer pleas deals to reduce their workload. They're not going to waste time on a marginal case.
  - scarface74 8y ago
    A plea bargain and the ability to threaten the accused with long prison sentence means they can get convictions for marginal cases.
  - gowld 8y ago
    What's wrong with our laws and our country if we have so many criminals that we can't afford to prosecute them? We should fix that problem instead of papering over it.
    - scarface74 8y ago
fake-name 8y ago
> I think it's something about remorse. Maintaining innocence when you know you're guilty shows a lack of remorse about what you've done. Admitting what you did and that you did it shows you at least know it's wrong and that you deserve some punishment. Yeah, but that hinges entirely under the assumption that the accused is guilty. What if they're legitimately not?
- fastball 8y ago
  Then they still have more options? The existence of plea bargains does not make you more likely to get convicted of a crime you didn't commit if you are pleading innocent.
  - ctjackso 8y ago
    But it's literally a heavily studied question in decision theory, and there are tons of statistics that people are too scared by the potential consequences to fight for their own right, when they know they're innocent. Sure, if you are pleading innocent there's potentially no or a lower effect - but the probability of a defendant pleading innocent is _significantly_ impacted by the existence of plea bargains.
  - ergothus 8y ago
    The problem is the unknowns. Let's say you are wrongly charged with a crime and the evidence is enough that the prosecution is moving forward. The max sentence is 30 years, and you're offered a plea of 2 years. There is a chance the system will utterly fail you, and a chance that the system will correctly find you innocent. You don't know those odds. You only know your fears. And the prosecution has a LOT of tools to raise those fears. Society has given you LOTS of reasons to trust those fears. But one thing you won't have is security that your innocence means you will not be found guilty. 2 years is a major problem, but...marriages have survived that. You'll be around to see your kids/nieces/nephews hit most of their major life milestones, and more importantly, a lot of day-to-day normality of what you call life. 30 years...your life has ended. Every relationship is over, every daily experience, everything you define as you. You have a LOT on the line, and the system...enh, it has very little on the line. What odds of failure of the system do you find worth the risk? If anyone takes a plea deal when they are innocent, they may very well be saving themselves some real pain. Or they may be needlessly damning themselves to life as a (ex)con. We don't know. But that it seems a viable option EVEN WHEN INNOCENT is definitely a problem. Making the system more reliable should definitely happen, but that won't remove the imbalance of incentives.
ergothus 8y ago
> Maintaining innocence when you know you're guilty shows a lack of remorse about what you've done. Yet pleading guilty only because you get a payoff for it doesn't really say anything about your remorse either. Not attacking you or your position (whatever that may be) - I know you're just explaining the reason we have this system, but it's also worth pointing out that said rationale isn't uncontested.
gowld 8y ago
> you say it should be about how long it would take to rehabilitate a person, that's different for every person. This is why parole hearings exist. You don't need to decide the number in advance.
- bena 8y ago
  That is if you aren't jailed without chance for a parole until X years. Do you really think there's a minimum number of years to rehabilitate someone from theft? Vandalism? Murder? If you believe it's solely about how long it takes to rehabilitate people, then sentencing shouldn't exist. Prisons should be run drastically different. And records shouldn't be made public because one of the main causes of recidivism is the stigma you get from being a felon.

lordnacho 8y ago

Yeah I always thought this was weird. I haven't had much contact with the actual criminal system, but the way it's portrayed in popular culture makes it look all wrong. Can it really be that you can trade punishment for efficiency (of the legal system)? Is that really why you're allowed to do that? It seems like a terrible time for people to be playing poker, yet that's what it looks like. One interesting twist is helping the prosecution. If you turn in a fellow bad guy, by giving evidence that helps put him away, should you be allowed to trade in your own punishment for his? Presumably the same argument applies, right? Whatever you did was just as wrong, why should you get anything different? But you need some incentive...

pointytrees 8y ago

Another unfortunate factor is.... if you take the plea for 2, case closed. If you don't take the plea, then that makes a lot more work for everyone involved (justice department) to take it to trial.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

pvg 8y ago

Can you think of any practitioner or other serious critic of the US justice system who thinks the fundamental problem is plea deals? They always seem to be trotted out in these discussions as somehow obviously bad and unfair on the level of, say, abusive civil forfeiture. But the objection you are describing is the difference between a possible, usually highly unlikely maximum sentence and a sentence arrived at in a plea deal. Only one of those is a real thing, though.

AnthonyMouse 8y ago
> But the objection you are describing is the difference between a possible, usually highly unlikely maximum sentence and a sentence arrived at in a plea deal. Only one of those is a real thing, though. The maximum penalty does actually happen though, it's just not common. The problem is that you don't know if it will happen to you before the trial, so its existence is extremely coercive. It scares the crap out of people -- and people are risk averse. They'll take a 100% chance of 2 years over a 1% chance of 30 years, even if the expected value is lower, because on the off chance the coin comes up tails six times in a row, they lose their entire life.
- pvg 8y ago
  That's not a particularly important detail of my question.
mikeash 8y ago
It may not be the fundamental problem, but plea deals are still horribly unjust. They are punishment for asserting your rights. They should never have been allowed and should be abolished.
- pvg 8y ago
  Ok, you feel strongly about plea deals but I still don't understand what the theory of supposed injustice is supposed to be. Why aren't people like Ken White railing against plea deals? Or maybe some are? Etc.

kimdotcom 8y ago

Agreed. I don't see how justice and bargains are compatible.

csa 8y ago

According to my defense attorney friend, a 2 plea and 20 trial offer means a few things: - It’s considered a 2-year crime. - The 20 (that seemed high to him for a 2 year plea) is a fuck you for going to trial when you are almost undoubtedly guilty. As someone else mentioned, it seems to show a lack of remorse. - Note that both sentences will probably have time off for good behavior as well as possible probation. This can make each of the sentences less daunting (e.g., “2 years” might end up as 6 months served and 1.5 years probation). - Cooperating is a totally different issue. They use that to get a bigger fish (usually).

intralizee 8y ago
Oh please.., tell me nobody serious actually believes this nonsense. People go to prison and while innocent of all crimes accused. That attitude of certainty in any situation should bar a person from a career in the justice system.
- csa 8y ago
  While I agree that innocent people do go to jail sometimes, I think this is much rarer than you make it out to be. The instances I have heard of it, either the system was (or one or more actors in that system were) corrupt, or the defendant had incompetent counsel.
  - intralizee 8y ago
    How did I make it out to be? Also how do you respond, "this is much rare than you make it out to be" from reading my comment. (Assumptions) while attempting to justify madness is a scapegoat at best from changing ones view; from understanding the human error of the poor process. Now I have no way to know the frequency if it's rare or common. Unrelated to my past comment, I don't believe in free will and think the whole justice system is madness.
  - carlmr 8y ago
    https://www.innocenceproject.org/how-many-innocent-people-are-in-prison/ https://www.innocenceproject.org/how-many-innocent-people-ar... The current estimate is roughly 1%. Sending someone to prison is basically taking some or all of their life. We currently have an estimated 20,000 innocent people in jail. That's not rare, and it's disgusting that this complete ethical failure of the American justice system is defended here.

gsnedders 8y ago

I live somewhere (Scotland) where there are no plea bargains. The whole concept seems bizarre to me, essentially negotiating punishment (especially having the prosecution involved in deciding the punishment).

tzs 8y ago
Scotland seems to have negotiated mechanisms that are similar to plea bargaining. It appears that prosecutors can make deals with defendants to replace more serious charges with less serious charges, which carry less jail time, if the defendants agree to plead guilty to those charges. Scotland also appears to give a substantial sentence reduction for defendants who plead guilty early. "PLEA AND CONFESSION BARGAINING IN SCOTLAND" [1] "Tensions and balances, costs and rewards: the sentence discount in Scotland" [2] "Furious 'stalking' victim slams courts for striking plea bargain with man who 'made her life a misery'" [3] [1] https://www.ejcl.org/103/abs103-8.html https://www.ejcl.org/103/abs103-8.html [2] https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/1422462.pdf https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/1422462.pdf [3] https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/crown-office-admits-striking-deal-12289201 https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/crown-offic...
wahern 8y ago
Scotland absolutely has plea bargains, and it's quite prevalent. The distinction with the U.S. system is that the judge is not as involved in the negotiations.[1] The process of charge and fact bargaining is entirely dependent on informal negotiations between the prosecution and the defence. There is no involvement on the part of the judge. Scotland does not operate a system of American-style sentence bargaining. This means that the prosecution cannot guarantee to the accused that a particular sentence will result if he pleads guilty (unless the bargain means that the court’s sentencing powers are reduced because, for example, the offence to which the accused eventually pleads guilty has a maximum sentence). (https://www.ejcl.org/103/art103-8.pdf https://www.ejcl.org/103/art103-8.pdf) Also, IIUC in Scotland the prosecutor can often impose civil fines and other remedies in lieu of prosecution and do so completely independently of a court. Whereas in the U.S. such arrangements are less often in lieu of prosecution; rather they're terms of an actual conviction and still involve a court formalizing things. Really it seems the difference between the Scottish and U.S. system is largely semantics, and of course the fact that the criminal justice system in the U.S. is just plain harsh. Our harsher penalties compounded by charge stacking effectively gives courts huge leeway in terms of sentencing. Nobody would agree to plea for a small penalty if a court could unilaterally impose the harshest option. Combined with our constitutional law that all but prohibits a prosecutor from imposing penalties unilaterally (voluntarily or not), and it's clear why our plea bargaining process involves the judge and so-called sentence bargaining more so than in other similar systems. [1] Or rather, the court gives little or no weight to the terms of the "contract" between the defendant and prosecutor, which can increase the risk for the defendant. Whereas in the U.S. the court has much less discretion to ignore the terms of a plea bargain, and in addition the judge will often mediate, which of course all but guarantees his imprimatur. Therefore there's less risk for a defendant and he will be more likely to take a plea deal.

everdev 8y ago

I wonder how much time and money is saved by plea deals. No plea deals or minimal plea deals would be an incentive to go to trial even if the evidence is overwhelming as you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. I think you see this in high profile murder cases because the plea deal is usually life in prison, which is not much of a bargain for most people so they might a well roll the dice like OJ did and hope the prosecution screws up. I think they're drastically different from the trial punishment for a reason.

washadjeffmad 8y ago

I'd remove pleading as well. Why should we gamify trial outcomes by forcing the accused to place a bet against what a judge or jury will decide when it should be based on the evidence? If evidence to convict is not sufficient or present, why do we require a conviction?