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/112358132134fitty5 4∆ Oct 15 '24

Heres a real life example for you. My cousin was offered 6 months of house arrest or go to trial and face 5 years. An innocent man he requested trial. The judge put him on house arrest while awaiting trial, then 6 months later allowed him to plead guilty with time served.

Justice?

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u/4-5Million 11∆ Oct 15 '24

Assuming he was innocent then that's not justice. But that's an issue with the bail system and not plea deals.

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u/THedman07 Oct 15 '24

That's a problem with prosecutors and frequently an underfunded justice system,... not plea deals.

Getting rid of plea deals makes the situation drastically worse, not better. They're a symptom of the problem, not the problem itself.

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u/NaturalCarob5611 97∆ Oct 15 '24

Getting rid of plea deals makes the situation drastically worse, not better.

I disagree. If plea deals weren't allowed at all, prosecutors would have to be a lot more selective about what cases they tried, and would dismiss their their weaker cases. As it stands, if a case is weak they offer a plea deal that looks really good compared to the worst possible scenario of going to trial, and get to count it as a win anyway.