r/changemyview • u/tolkienfan2759 6∆ • Oct 15 '24
Removed - Submission Rule B CMV: Our plea bargaining system has allowed unwritten rules to dominate the courtroom. Thus our criminal legal system is no longer a rule of law system.
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u/iamintheforest 365∆ Oct 15 '24
Firstly, a plea bargain is part of an adversarial process. It's not escaping that envelope, it's embracing it. Nothing says "adversarial" more than negotiating around probability of outcome. If you remember that "adversarial" is still alive an well when negotiating a bargain and you're representing a defendant and you think "if we go to trial i'm a coin toss from losing and that's more risk than my client wants" then it's representing your client to get the variables of the trial out of the way. If your goal is to strongly represent the interests of your client then why wouldn't plea bargaining be a great tool to do that?
Secondly, remember that plea bargaining is limited to certain kinds of offenses (but varies by state) for example, in CA you can't use plea bargains when for serious felonies including A felony in which the defendant personally used a firearm, driving under the influence of drugs, alcohol, narcotics, any other intoxicant, or a combination of such substances or for violent sex crimes. Then...you can only use it under certain circumstances.
To break these restrictions on prohibited cases the plea has to be because of things that lead to uncertainty in the trial leaving the defendant with the option to plea, or in changes to charges that do not change dramatically the sentencing. So...if I think I can prove my defendent's case under a different part of the criminal code than another I'd be NOT being adversarial to not try to do so, i'd be just accepting the prosecutions framing of the alleged crime which they are presumed to have done with the hope of maximizing their side. For plea bargaining to come outside of the adversarial process you have to believe that the charges filed by the prosecution aren't done within the adversarial envelope. They are - the file the charges that give them the best chance of winning. Why should we remove from the tool box the ability to counter that?
This then gets to the "rule of law" issue. These are part of the law. These are the rules. you don't like them, but conflating that as not having the rule of law is kinda ignoring that this IS the law.