5 ms·

I think you are letting your hatred of the US cloud your judgement. Plea bargaining is mostly a cost saving measure, going to trial is very expensive.

kghose 12y ago
Please don't feed the trolls.
ObviousScience 12y ago
Except that I know people who have accepted plea bargains for things that they probably would have prevailed at trial on, because the risk of losing at trial outweighs accepting the plea bargain (or they didn't have the money for a proper defense to refute police misconduct, etc). A particular instance I'm privy to the details of was a friend accepting a bargain on a resisting arrest charge (it probably got reduced to a more minor charge in the bargain) that only led to community service (and probation), when the reality is that the police officer had assaulted the defendant and they were covering it up. It simply wasn't worth the risk of going to jail and the certainty of financial trouble for him and his kids to fight the city on it. But the city got a conviction against a troublesome black, or whatever euphemism they're using these days, and didn't have to admit wrongdoing on the part of a police officer, so all good, right? I'm not saying all plea bargains are bad, I'm just saying that the US makes suspicious use of them and some of them have been noted to be abusive (eg, that they charge ridiculous things for the trial and agree to plea down to what the charges should've been in the first place). I view this as semi-rampant prosecutor misconduct, rather than a fundamental problem with plea bargains, though plea bargains make this kind of misconduct easier, if not otherwise policed.
jacquesm 12y ago
Justice should not be about cost.
- happyscrappy 12y ago
  It also costs time. This Russian cracker will plead out.
  - malandrew 12y ago
    You're assuming guilt. Unless you have some special knowledge of this particular individual, the general ideal we originally strived for in the US Justice system is a belief that individuals are considered innocent until proven guilty. It's fine if you want to believe that yourself, but it's contradictory to how the US justice system is supposed to work. I'm of the opinion that trials should be system where both sides should be allowed to put as much money as they want into a trial, but that they need to put that money into a pot that is divided equally between the defense and prosecution. You cannot have justice when there is financial asymmetry. This would allow trials to be as cheap or as expensive as necessary to determine the truth. It provides a great disincentive for either side to pour money into the process if they know they are in the wrong going into a trial.
    - tptacek 12y ago
      Stipulate that some significant portion of the accused are, in fact, guilty. We don't know which ones, but we know in the abstract that they exist. We also know that the overwhelming majority --- not all, but most --- of the guilty accused know they're guilty. In your proposed system, what's the incentive that prevents the guilty accused from allocating infinite resources to their case? Why not do that? These are people who've drawn off-suit seven deuce in the poker game of justice. What would they have to lose?
      - jacquesm 12y ago
        > What would they have to lose? Absolutely nothing, and that's just fine. Let them have their day, even 10 days in court. If they're guilty it will still stick. If not they should walk, no matter how long it takes to get to that point. The way to deal with the overload is a many pronged problem, for one you could decide not to have so many crimes on the books, second you could decide which crimes are to be dealt with using fines and which are to be dealt with using prison time, and prison time could be seen as a measure of correction rather than one of punishment or revenge. That would mean that there would be a lot less prisoners and that in turn would upset a whole pile of applecarts but on the whole that's not a bad system to have. At least you won't have 1% of the population (and 2% of the adult population) behind bars which is generally considered to be a good thing because it takes people out of circulation causing a domino effect into the next generation. Kids of convicts are more likely to become convicts themselves. http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/gokids/gokids_articles_children_impacted.html http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/gokids/gokids_articles_children_... Compromising the right to a fair trial on cost basis because you're scared the 'guilty accused' will hog the system has a much higher cost in the longer term.
- tptacek 12y ago
  A system without plea bargains offers no incentive for any rational person to cooperate. It instead encourages everyone, guilty and innocent, to ruthlessly impose additional costs on the rest of society --- most notably on the innocent accused, who are allocated fewer resources with which to vindicate themselves.
  - crististm 12y ago
    What about truth? It is assumed that prosecution see you as guilty. But what if they got the wrong person? It's not like it never happened. Besides, what is the downside for prosecution (as individual) for a wrongful convictions?
    - tptacek 12y ago
      There is inadequate downside for prosecutors making bad-faith or risky cases. But the question I posed was practical, not moral: in the absence of plea deals, there is no disincentive for the guilty accused to grind the system to a halt with pointless litigation. The people who would pay the steepest price for that wouldn't be the citizenry at large, but rather the innocent accused.
      - jacquesm 12y ago
        Whatever happened to rather that 10 guilty men walk free rather than that one man be jailed innocent? The innocent accused are paying the steepest price today, they end up pleading guilty, lose their livelihood, rights, and lots more. If the system would grind to a halt it would grind to a halt for everybody, not just for the guilty. And maybe that would allow for a better system rather than one where might makes right and the amount of money you can muster for your defense is the biggest factor in determining the outcome.
        tptacek 12y ago
        No, it does not logically follow that because the innocent accused face an unjust burden today, stupid decisions we make going forward couldn't make their burden even worse. There was a New Yorker story about a young defendant spending years in Rikers waiting for a trial that saw continuance after continuance; that's what happens today, in a system that relies heavily on plea deals to clear caseloads.
crististm 12y ago
I think they should just put him in jail. Look at his picture - it's his 'guilty' posture!!!

kghose 12y ago

Please don't feed the trolls.

ObviousScience 12y ago

Except that I know people who have accepted plea bargains for things that they probably would have prevailed at trial on, because the risk of losing at trial outweighs accepting the plea bargain (or they didn't have the money for a proper defense to refute police misconduct, etc). A particular instance I'm privy to the details of was a friend accepting a bargain on a resisting arrest charge (it probably got reduced to a more minor charge in the bargain) that only led to community service (and probation), when the reality is that the police officer had assaulted the defendant and they were covering it up. It simply wasn't worth the risk of going to jail and the certainty of financial trouble for him and his kids to fight the city on it. But the city got a conviction against a troublesome black, or whatever euphemism they're using these days, and didn't have to admit wrongdoing on the part of a police officer, so all good, right? I'm not saying all plea bargains are bad, I'm just saying that the US makes suspicious use of them and some of them have been noted to be abusive (eg, that they charge ridiculous things for the trial and agree to plea down to what the charges should've been in the first place). I view this as semi-rampant prosecutor misconduct, rather than a fundamental problem with plea bargains, though plea bargains make this kind of misconduct easier, if not otherwise policed.

jacquesm 12y ago

Justice should not be about cost.

happyscrappy 12y ago
It also costs time. This Russian cracker will plead out.
- malandrew 12y ago
  You're assuming guilt. Unless you have some special knowledge of this particular individual, the general ideal we originally strived for in the US Justice system is a belief that individuals are considered innocent until proven guilty. It's fine if you want to believe that yourself, but it's contradictory to how the US justice system is supposed to work. I'm of the opinion that trials should be system where both sides should be allowed to put as much money as they want into a trial, but that they need to put that money into a pot that is divided equally between the defense and prosecution. You cannot have justice when there is financial asymmetry. This would allow trials to be as cheap or as expensive as necessary to determine the truth. It provides a great disincentive for either side to pour money into the process if they know they are in the wrong going into a trial.
  - tptacek 12y ago
    Stipulate that some significant portion of the accused are, in fact, guilty. We don't know which ones, but we know in the abstract that they exist. We also know that the overwhelming majority --- not all, but most --- of the guilty accused know they're guilty. In your proposed system, what's the incentive that prevents the guilty accused from allocating infinite resources to their case? Why not do that? These are people who've drawn off-suit seven deuce in the poker game of justice. What would they have to lose?
    - jacquesm 12y ago
      > What would they have to lose? Absolutely nothing, and that's just fine. Let them have their day, even 10 days in court. If they're guilty it will still stick. If not they should walk, no matter how long it takes to get to that point. The way to deal with the overload is a many pronged problem, for one you could decide not to have so many crimes on the books, second you could decide which crimes are to be dealt with using fines and which are to be dealt with using prison time, and prison time could be seen as a measure of correction rather than one of punishment or revenge. That would mean that there would be a lot less prisoners and that in turn would upset a whole pile of applecarts but on the whole that's not a bad system to have. At least you won't have 1% of the population (and 2% of the adult population) behind bars which is generally considered to be a good thing because it takes people out of circulation causing a domino effect into the next generation. Kids of convicts are more likely to become convicts themselves. http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/gokids/gokids_articles_children_impacted.html http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/gokids/gokids_articles_children_... Compromising the right to a fair trial on cost basis because you're scared the 'guilty accused' will hog the system has a much higher cost in the longer term.
tptacek 12y ago
A system without plea bargains offers no incentive for any rational person to cooperate. It instead encourages everyone, guilty and innocent, to ruthlessly impose additional costs on the rest of society --- most notably on the innocent accused, who are allocated fewer resources with which to vindicate themselves.
- crististm 12y ago
  What about truth? It is assumed that prosecution see you as guilty. But what if they got the wrong person? It's not like it never happened. Besides, what is the downside for prosecution (as individual) for a wrongful convictions?
  - tptacek 12y ago
    There is inadequate downside for prosecutors making bad-faith or risky cases. But the question I posed was practical, not moral: in the absence of plea deals, there is no disincentive for the guilty accused to grind the system to a halt with pointless litigation. The people who would pay the steepest price for that wouldn't be the citizenry at large, but rather the innocent accused.
    - jacquesm 12y ago
      Whatever happened to rather that 10 guilty men walk free rather than that one man be jailed innocent? The innocent accused are paying the steepest price today, they end up pleading guilty, lose their livelihood, rights, and lots more. If the system would grind to a halt it would grind to a halt for everybody, not just for the guilty. And maybe that would allow for a better system rather than one where might makes right and the amount of money you can muster for your defense is the biggest factor in determining the outcome.
      - tptacek 12y ago
        No, it does not logically follow that because the innocent accused face an unjust burden today, stupid decisions we make going forward couldn't make their burden even worse. There was a New Yorker story about a young defendant spending years in Rikers waiting for a trial that saw continuance after continuance; that's what happens today, in a system that relies heavily on plea deals to clear caseloads.

crististm 12y ago

I think they should just put him in jail. Look at his picture - it's his 'guilty' posture!!!