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I completely agree, but plea bargains are also the basic mechanism by which the justice system functioned. They represent something like 95% of convictions. If
by CobrastanJorji 5y ago
I completely agree, but plea bargains are also the basic mechanism by which the justice system functioned. They represent something like 95% of convictions. If everybody who currently took a plea switched to demanding a trial, we'd need at least twenty times as many judges and juries.
I'm not against that, mind you, I'm just saying that you are proposing a massive sea change in the legal system. Everything about the recommended sentencing to basic questions like "what incentives can we offer to flip on someone" would need to be completely rethought.
- chalst 5y agoGiven the US imprisons its citizens at nearly ten times the rate that Germany does, has hugely unpredictable outcomes to civil suits, and clearly has serious problems with reliability of convictions in criminal cases, the question shouldn't be whether the US should have radical changes to its legal system, but how to achieve it.
- stjohnswarts 5y agoGermans also tend to be more stable and commit less crimes than the USA, the crime rate here is also very high compared to Germany, including white collar crime. However, yeah our industrial prison complex system is extremely backward and should concentrate much more on rehabilitation and making sure that it's a (relatively) safe environment with things like 100% camera coverage since prison violence and rape are such a common thing.