The criminal justice system within the United States is the practice law enforcement from several levels, local, state and federal. The court system is where the law enforcement process meets to decide what penalties to pass onto the defendants. Part of this process begins before and sometimes during the trial in which the prosecution or defense attorney will initiate a process known as plea-bargaining, which means a mutually acceptable sentence is agreed upon by prosecution and the defense. This process will cancel the need for a trial or end a trial if one has already started.
Is plea-bargaining a good thing or a bad thing for the criminal justice system? Should prosecutors have the discretion to offer a plea bargain without consulting the victim? Plea bargains can benefit both the prosecution and defense, especially if the prosecution does not have enough to win a trial or if the defense knows they have no way of getting their client found not guilty. Plea bargaining helps a defendant get lesser time in prison than the defendant faced in found guilty in a court of law. Should prosecutors have the discretion to offer a plea bargain without consulting the victim or do prosecutors owe victims more justice?
Benefits
The plea bargaining process offers some benefits to the defendant and serves as a benefit to the criminal justice system itself. Many people are impacted positively by the application of a plea agreement. Some of the benefits are as follows:
Defendant:
- can get less time in prison
- can get multiple charges dropped
- avoiding trial can save on attorney fees
Victim:
- can give a victim the closer he or she needs to go on with life
- can give them the justice they seek
Prosecution:
- saves court time
- lets them accept a deal with a defendant who admits guilt and accepts responsibility
- helps a prosecutor maintain an acceptable conviction rate
According to Michael Tonry (1998), about 75% of criminal cases end in guilty pleas and most of those come from plea agreements and in federal court almost all defendants who plead guilty under a plea agreement receive a 20% reduction in their sentence. One of the biggest benefits that plea bargaining offers is that it saves money and of course time. There simply is not enough money to try every single case that is filed in a court of law, so plea-bargaining keeps the criminal justice system from collapsing under the strain that would occur if every case had to go to trial.
The Criticism
Plea bargaining receives a fair amount of criticism, some of that is coming from defendants who allege that they were forced to take a plea deal when a prosecutor overcharged them to scare them into accepting a plea agreement for a lesser charge. In addition, the public criticizes the use of plea bargains because they see a criminal getting a break which allows the criminal to get a basic insignificant punishment. For example, armed robbery will become unarmed robbery, also known as swallowing the gun or a burglary that occurred at night will become a burglary by day, which is a lesser crime.
Should the plea bargain be banned? In August of 1975, Alaska did just that and banned plea-bargaining and in 1976, the Alaskan Judicial Council released a computer study that showed the following results:
- longer prison sentences
- no trial court backlogs
- cases were disposed of faster
- backlog formed in the civil courts
So banning the plea agreement has both pluses and minuses. However, this was back in 1975 and in a state, which was not seeing as many cases as a state like Texas or California. Would the same occur in the year 2008 and would other states that see more cases than Alaska? Therefore, in smaller states or in smaller local levels a ban might work just fine, but in larger states that see hundreds of thousands of cases a year, it would be unfeasible.
When the laws on plea bargaining were first drafted into the books, only the worse offenders were the intended targets, but now the laws are used on some of most basic crimes and on first time offenders. That is not the only way in which the law is being abused under the plea-bargaining law, because innocent people will plead guilty to lesser charges just for the simple reason that they cannot to go to trial because they cannot afford to financially.
Prosecutorial Discretion
Prosecutorial discretion has been controversial at several times in history, but none more so when dealing with the topic of plea-bargaining. Should a prosecutor have the discretion to offer a plea bargain? A prosecutor has a readily available knowledge of the law and the experience needed to know whether their case is winnable or not and sometimes, they have to plead a case out in order to send a criminal to prison, even if for less time than they deserve. Prosecutors get to keep their conviction rates up and get to remove the criminal, albeit temporarily, from the streets and away from innocent civilians.
The Victims
Plea bargaining does violate the legal intention of just deserts, which means that specific crimes will garner specific penalization. Some people say that when a defendant receives a lesser penalty than is just, that true justice was not served and justice was denied to the victim or victims.
Numerous jurisdictions observe statutes that require prosecutors to notify victims of plea-bargaining. For example, an Indiana prosecutor in a felony case must inform the victim in the case of the plea bargaining dialogues with the defendant or the defendant’s attorney. If an agreement is made, the prosecutor is required to show the agreement to the victim and the victim is still allowed to make a statement at the sentencing hearing (Fisher, 2003).
Arizona‘s laws states:
“1. The prosecuting attorney advises the court that before requesting the negotiated plea [,] reasonable efforts must be made to confer with the victim. 2. Reasonable efforts are made to give the victim notice of the plea proceeding . . . and to inform the victim that the victim has the right to be present and, if present, to be heard. 3. The prosecuting attorney advises the court that to the best of the prosecutor’s knowledge [,] notice requirements . . . have been complied with and the prosecutor informs the court of the victims’ position, if known, regarding the negotiated plea.”
The plea bargain can be seen in one more perspective and that is through the eyes of the victim’s family. For the family, justice does not occur until some jury convicts the criminal of all charges and that does not occur when a plea bargain lessens the charges the criminal will face when sentenced. The family believes that a defendant has to serve the maximum amount of time in prison and not one minute less; however, a plea bargain means that the family must live with the fear than the criminal will be back on the street within a few years.
Despite the negative feelings on the subject of plea bargains, it needs to be mentioned that prosecutors who want to spare the victim the pain of having to testify, this is favorable in cases involving young children, someone who is seriously ill or elderly people, sometimes offers plea bargains.
Conclusion
Plea bargains can be both good and bad things, good for a prosecutor who does not have a good case, good for a defendant looking for a break and great for a defense attorney who want to help his client. Plea bargaining can be bad for the victim and the victim’s family, especially when it leads to the defendant getting out early. A plea bargain can cut down on the caseload and therefore save money. Is plea-bargaining right or wrong? Well it can depend on what side one is on and it depends on ones understanding of the law; no matter what one opinion is, plea bargains are legal
Sources:
Department of Justice (2007 March 7) Victim’s Input Into Plea Agreements, Legal Series # 7.
Department of Justice.
Fisher, George (2003) Plea Bargaining’s Triumph, A History of Plea Bargaining in America.
Stanford University Press.
Tonry, Michael (1998 January 8) Sentencing Matters (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)
Oxford University Press.
