Plea bargaining speaks more of the public attitude than actual justice.

[pknopp]

No doubt about it...innocent people go to prison.

The number you quote is in the hundreds. I think there are currently something like 2M Americans in prison right now in addition to countless numbers who served their sentence and are on parole.

One is too many but zero isn’t a standard that is attainable. Hundreds out of millions is no sign that "They don't care if they have the right person, as long as they can lock SOMEONE up."

It doesn't always happen but it happens far too often.

 

[candycorn]

It doesn't always happen but it happens far too often.

We arrest far too many people. Scores too many.

 

[BackAgain]

The reality is that our society does indeed have too many people getting prosecuted at any given time. So, yes. Without plea-bargaining, our criminal justice system would simply collapse.

The draw of a plea bargain is obvious. A prosecutor can garner at least some level of justice against a defendant (assuming actual guilt). The defendant can often minimize his or her exposure to the real risks of a much longer sentences (albeit at the cost of having to accept “some” time in prison).

For more serious crimes, it’s an almost unavoidable truth that the plea bargaining process ain’t going away any time soon.

But for the relatively minor crimes, maybe the problem is that we criminalize too many things. For the most part, these are not national issues. They are problems for the respective individual States.

 

[Jarlaxle]

No doubt about it...innocent people go to prison.

The number you quote is in the hundreds. I think there are currently something like 2M Americans in prison right now in addition to countless numbers who served their sentence and are on parole.

One is too many but zero isn’t a standard that is attainable. Hundreds out of millions is no sign that "They don't care if they have the right person, as long as they can lock SOMEONE up."

You need to reread the post. The whole post. For COMPREHENSION.

 

[M14 Shooter]

You need to reread the post. The whole post. For COMPREHENSION.

Why?
She's just going to lie about it.
Its all she does.

 

[WorldWatcher]

Funny I happened across this video the other day and went back and looked it up.

It does a historical review of the explosion on incarcaration rates in the US as compared to other countries. Programs that saved money in the long run but were cut because of short term budget ignoring massively lowering recidivism (and therefore costs). Toward the end there is a comparison of US "incarcarate for revenge" vs. Norwegian rehabilitation model (excluding of course those who committed violent crimes and continue to be a danger.

WW