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While most criminal cases are resolved by a guilty plea, little empirical research has examined guilty plea wrongful convictions. This study explored this issue through semistructured interviews with 27 legal professionals in Queensland, Australia (n = 16 defense lawyers; n = 7 prosecutors; n = 4 magistrates). Driven by a systems and organizational perspective, we conducted a thematic analysis exploring the structural and organizational features that may systematically contribute to erroneous guilty plea convictions. We found an overarching emphasis on efficiency and pressure to quickly resolve cases, coupled with practical constraints impeding legal professionals from ensuring guilty pleas are appropriate and accurate. There was also a general acceptance of false guilty pleas through the justification of "choice," legitimized by the authoritative precedent set by Meissner v R (1995). The findings indicate the routine nature of erroneous guilty plea convictions and raise important implications regarding the current validity of a guilty plea, as they do not always reflect actual guilt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Research has identified racial and ethnic disparities in rates of guilty pleas relative to trial where minorities are more likely to proceed to trial, though little research has explored the source of this disparity. Methods: vUsing an adult nationwide sample and a vignette methodology, this research uses Ordinary Least Squares regression to explore differences in White, Black, and Hispanic defendants' willingness to accept a guilty plea (WTAP). Results: Though there are not significant direct effects of race or ethnicity on initial WTAP, there are racial/ethnic differences in theoretical antecedents of WTAP such as perceived probability of conviction, court legitimacy, and attorney type. However, there are not differences in the effects of theoretical antecedents on WTAP across race or ethnicity. Significant differences by race/ethnicity also emerge following a defense attorney's evaluation of an offer and are conditional on guilt. Conclusions: Racial/ethnic differences in rates of plea acceptance are likely due to cumulative racial/ethnic differences in antecedents of WTAP, differences in the effect of attorney evaluation by race/ethnicity, and/or factors that were not directly examined in this study such as variation in plea offers. Implications for future research on the nexus between plea bargaining and race/ethnicity are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Innocent until proven guilty? For some who have walked through the criminal justice system, this American adage did not seem to ring true. The criminal justice system has produced many wrongful convictions, which is an unthinkable injustice. These individuals must then fight for compensation to get back on their feet in society after spending years, if not decades, unjustly behind bars. Ohio's wrongful conviction compensation statute perpetuates this injustice by categorically excluding exonerees who pled guilty to a crime they did not commit from receiving compensation from the State, with no exceptions. This Note critically analyzes the inherent harms from such an exclusion and proposes an amendment to Ohio's compensation statute that remedies these harms by giving the exoneree an opportunity to show why they pled guilty to a crime they did not commit. Ohio's abandonment of this guilty plea disqualification provision in the compensation statute would be one step in the direction of seeking justice for those who were presumed guilty until proven innocent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last two decades, U.S. courts have convicted hundreds of thousands of Latin American defendants for misdemeanor immigration crimes. This has mostly happened through a federal program called Operation Streamline. In that program, immigrants are convicted without any semblance of due process. They are charged with the crime of entering the United States, have a brief conversation with a defense lawyer, plead guilty in a mass plea hearing with up to one hundred defendants at once, and receive their sentence--all in a single court appearance. In 2018, this program encountered its first organized resistance. In that year, the Trump Administration tried to bring Operation Streamline to California for the first time. There, immigrant defendants and their lawyers did not acquiesce to a norm of immediate guilty pleas. Instead, they fought their cases by securing release on bond, raising objections, taking their cases to trial, and appealing their convictions. This unexpected resistance prevented federal prosecutors from processing dozens of cases per day. In 2021, something similar happened in Texas. Governor Greg Abbott created a state-law version of Operation Streamline called Operation Lone Star. Immigrant defendants and their lawyers have resisted this program as well, securing release on bond and fighting through motions, writs, and trials. This Article documents, analyzes, and draws lessons from these immigrants' defiance. It does so using court records, transcripts, and firsthand accounts. In the process, this Article uncovers the institutional logic of these mass immigrant prosecution systems, which have become a major feature of U.S. immigration policy. It shows how these systems prioritize efficiency above all else, resulting in inferior jail conditions, summary court proceedings, and coerced guilty pleas. In particular, it critiques the role defense lawyers typically play in these systems. Defense lawyers are expected to facilitate these prosecutions by coaching their clients to plead guilty quickly. Their presence gives the proceedings a false legitimacy, as these systems are designed to prevent lawyers from providing competent counsel. As this Article argues, defense lawyers should instead undermine these systems by helping defendants assert their rights and litigate. Indeed, immigrant defendants have powerful incentives to fight their cases if their lawyers will help them. The battles in California and Texas reveal several effective legal strategies for immigrant defendants to resist mass criminalization. They also illustrate how criminal defense lawyers can pursue systemic litigation while honoring their duties to individual clients. The keys are to seek out situations where a defendant can safely assert their procedural rights, and to only waive those rights when doing so benefits the defendant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the research by Fiona Leverick and demonstrates the methodological flaws in much of the 'rape myth' and mock jury research. Other ideas about rape myths and the 'justice gap' are explored and seen to be questionable. Furthermore, through a detailed examination of the rape myth acceptance scales, which Leverick describes as being 'scientifically validated', we trace the ideological and political-ethical nature of these scales and show a clear one-sidedness in how researchers have used them. Most particularly, we find that there is one-sidedness when it comes to the question of victim empathy. One result of this is that mock jury research has indicated that victim empathetic participants are finding individuals guilty of rape, despite the lack of evidence, and almost nothing has been said about the potential miscarriages of justice being demonstrated in these cases. The argument is thus made that rather than there being overwhelming evidence of rape myth prejudices amongst the public, there appears to be a one-sidedness amongst most rape myth researchers that is encouraging a sentiment of victim empathy that could distort the principles of justice regarding defendants being innocent until proven guilty based on a need to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt. 1 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the present paper, we seek to understand how defendants form of perceptions blameworthiness and to assess how these perceptions affect willingness to accept a plea offer. With an online vignette survey (N = 659), we randomized 1) guilt and 2) riskiness of victim behavior in a vehicular manslaughter case. We also asked respondents to rate the blameworthiness of themselves and their victims. First, results indicate that guilty respondents were more likely to accept a plea than those who were innocent. Second, those in the low-risk victim behavior condition viewed themselves as more blameworthy. Third, people who view themselves as more blameworthy, or their victims as less blameworthy, are more likely to take a plea offer. Lastly, the effects of guilt, victim behavior, and perceptions of victim blameworthiness are also at least partially mediated by perceptions of self-blame. Overall, victim behavior was a key predictor of self-blameworthiness, which was then a critical predictor of WTAP. Results also suggest that respondents viewed blame as a zero-sum game and made decisions about whether to accept a plea based on whether they think they were at fault in the situation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The implications of a strategic model of plea bargaining are threefold. First, plea bargaining unequivocally increases wrongful convictions. Next, partial bans on plea bargaining reduce the frequency of wrongful convictions, and the reduction rises with the strength of the ban. Lastly, police share an important role in minimizing wrongful convictions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has long been argued that defendants detained pretrial face more severe case outcomes than released defendants. Considering the magnitude, directionality, and significance of these findings, this article uses systematic review and meta-analysis to examine the average effect of pretrial detention on a series of case processing outcomes: conviction, guilty plea, dismissal, charge reduction, incarceration, and sentence length. Assessing 143 effect sizes across 57 studies that met the inclusion criteria, findings indicated that detained defendants face more severe outcomes, with the strongest effect on their likelihood of incarceration. Pretrial detention had a medium effect on convictions, guilty pleas, and dismissals, a smaller effect on sentence length, and a non-significant, small effect on charge reductions. The studies' effect sizes were heterogeneous, highlighting the importance of jurisdictional differences in policies and practices. Moderator analyses were used to assess this variation. Future research should examine how disparity cumulates via the pretrial detention penalty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research Summary: Using data from the National Registry of Exonerations, we examined how the presence of confession evidence impacts prosecutors' tendency in order to (1) commit misconduct in any form (e.g., permitting perjury and witness tampering) and (2) specifically withhold exculpatory evidence (i.e., evidence favorable to the defense). We assess these relationships particularly in the context of wrongful convictions by guilty plea from an innocent individual (i.e., false guilty plea [FGP]) or guilty verdict at trial. We show the presence of false confessions increased the likelihood of (1) prosecutors engaging in misconduct generally and (2) prosecutors withholding exculpatory evidence specifically. However, the presence of prosecutorial misconduct and withholding evidence decreased the odds of a wrongful conviction via an FGP compared to wrongful conviction via guilty verdict. Policy Implications: Policies encouraging prosecutorial transparency and accountability are needed in order to better identify misconduct when it occurs, particularly in the context of guilty pleas. Open‐file discovery policies, which aim to provide full transparency, may prevent prosecutors from intentionally or unintentionally withholding evidence when faced with strong evidence like a confession, which could ultimately decrease the potential of wrongful conviction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Criminal defendants can face significant pressures to plead guilty, but wrongful conviction scholarship has largely overlooked the study of guilty pleas. This study content analyzed 139 Australian appellate court judgments in which a guilty plea conviction was overturned, investigating the types of errors involved in these convictions, and the stage of the criminal justice process at which the errors occurred. The findings revealed that errors occurred during the police investigation, pretrial preparations, and formal court procedures, with the most frequent errors involving incorrect or inappropriate charges, inadequate legal representation, and the courts erroneously accepting a guilty plea. The findings raise important implications regarding the adequacy of safeguards to ensure guilty pleas are appropriate or factually and legally accurate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: It is well established that defendants who plead guilty receive reduced sentences compared to the likely outcome if convicted at trial. Prominent theories of plea bargaining posit that the plea discount is determined by the strength of the evidence against the defendant. Research on this claim has produced mixed findings, however, and others have suggested that discounts may be influenced by extra-legal characteristics such as race, age, and sex. To date, there have been few attempts to directly compare the effects of these factors on plea discount estimates. Methods: This study uses a penalized ridge regression to predict counterfactual trial sentences for a sample of defendants who pled guilty. Plea discounts are estimated using each defendant's predicted trial sentence and observed plea sentence. Discount estimates are then regressed on variables related to case evidence and the demographic characteristics of the defendant. Results: Results suggest that increases in the amount of evidence associated with a case lead to decreases in the size of the plea discount. Both main and interaction effects are observed for race/ethnicity and sex, with Hispanic and male defendants receiving significantly smaller discounts than White or female defendants. Calculation of standardized effect sizes further indicates that demographic characteristics exert larger effects on plea discount estimates than evidentiary variables. Conclusions: Plea discounts appear to be influenced by both evidence and extra-legal factors. Legal participants may indeed consider the strength of the evidence when determining acceptable plea discounts, but this alone appears to be an insufficient explanation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the first paper to study accomplice plea bargains when motivated jurors incur an effort cost. I find that a prosecutor who wishes to ensure punishment for the guilty, and acquittal for the innocent, induces a unique perfect Bayesian equilibrium which is fully separating, simultaneously minimizing court costs as well as jurors' cognitive efforts. In this equilibrium, a very harsh plea bargain (with negligible plea discounting) is offered, and is accepted by all guilty defendants, and rejected by all innocent ones. Though the prosecutor has the ability to induce semi-separating equilibria, he will prefer the fully separating one. We can use the Cho-Kreps intuitive criterion to show that a pooling equilibrium does not exist. My results contrast sharply with the plea bargaining literature which finds a tradeoff between sorting efficiency and the harshness of punishments meted out to the guilty and which does not support a fully separating equilibrium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Special stigma attaches to zealous public defenders. They are widely viewed as undermining the public welfare, of acting immorally, and of inappropriately empathizing with criminals over victims. Poor funding for public defender offices in many jurisdictions underscores what the body politic in those places thinks of unsparingly zealous public defense. The stigma finds sustenance in an account endorsed by zealous public defenders themselves--that they function as client-centered advocates, operating largely outside the criminal justice system and without caring about the public welfare, about guilt or innocence, or much about victims. This scenario poses a dilemma for zealous public defenders who aim to counter the allegations or for poorly funded defender offices that seek to acquire more resources so that they can consistently provide zealous representation. How can they rebut criticisms with which they largely agree? This Article argues that they could, in theory, acknowledge their work as multi-faceted, requiring that they sometimes serve as zealous advocates but often also in several roles that directly benefit the state. This alternate perspective finds support in the Supreme Court's acknowledgement in recent years that criminal justice has become, for the most part, a system of guilty pleas rather than of trials. Although this strategy is the most truthful and responsive to the critics, this Article finds it unworkable from the perspective of the zealous public defenders, which reveals a conundrum. Zealous public defenders must deceive themselves that they are rebels who do not care about the public interest (or about justice or victims) to effectively serve it. Although they face difficulty in making their own case, this Article exposes the reality and the illusion to help defend zealous public defenders against their critics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines a trend in the U.S. in which defendants are pressured to plead guilty and the use of waivers of rights in guilty plea agreements. Topics discussed include examples of demands to defendants from prosecutors that are considered unreasonable, the failure of the U.S. Supreme Court's jurisprudence in regulating such demands, and the reliance of the Court on the assistance of counsel in advising defendants to accept or reject such plea offers.

While the difficulties in appealing a guilty plea conviction are widely acknowledged, little research has investigated how appellate courts handle guilty plea convictions. This study addresses this gap by examining Australian appellate court judgments in which a guilty plea conviction was contested, comparing successful appeals where a guilty plea conviction was overturned (n = 193) against unsuccessful appeals where a guilty plea conviction remained (n = 375). Hierarchical multiple logistic regression analysis revealed that, independent of other case characteristics, legal representation on appeal and support from legal actors significantly predicted a successful appeal, while significant predictors of an unsuccessful appeal included male defendants, defendants who received a term of imprisonment, and those who argued they were pressured to plead guilty. The findings highlight the significant influence of legal and extra-legal factors on appellate decision-making beyond the grounds of appeal raised by the defendant, raising important policy implications for the post-conviction process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Of course, in I Hamer i , unlike in either I McEvilly i or I Ismail i , the appellant had not been charged with alternative offences but with what was regarded by the prosecution as separate and distinct offences. Moreover, the imposition of concurrent rather than consecutive sentences for the s.139(1) and s.29 offences meant that the totality of the appellant's sentence, 15 months' imprisonment, was no greater than it would have been had he been convicted of the s.139(1) offence alone. But if the defendant is convicted by the jury on the more serious offence, he will be sentenced on that matter and the court should order that the alternative offence to which he had previously pleaded guilty should lie on the file' (at [21]). [Extracted from the article]

False guilty pleas, when innocent people are wrongfully convicted by pleading guilty, have beset criminal legal systems since the time guilty pleas came into existence. Today, of the nearly 3,300 exoneration cases catalogued by the National Registry of Exonerations (NRE), about 25% are wrongful convictions via guilty plea, with the remaining 75% by trial. In the present study, we code the known population of wrongful plea convictions, comparing them to the known population of wrongful trial convictions on numerous factors (e.g. dispositional and situational risk factors) to identify defining characteristics of false guilty plea cases. Overall, we found many notable differences. False guilty plea cases are four times more likely to involve a false confession and be the ‘no-crime’ type of wrongful conviction than trial cases. In contrast, trial cases were significantly more likely to involve eyewitness misidentification, forensic science errors, perjury or false accusations, and documented ineffective assistance of counsel claims than false guilty plea cases. Results shed much-needed light on the factors that associate with false guilty pleas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the vast majority of criminal cases in Canada and the United States are resolved through plea bargaining, research suggests that the public generally disapproves of this practice. Public disapproval toward plea bargaining may reflect the public's erroneous belief that all defendants who accept a plea are guilty and should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. At this time, it is unclear whether the public is aware of the fact that innocent defendants also accept plea bargains. We administered an exploratory survey to examine undergraduate students' (N = 237) and community members' (N = 259) perceptions of the situational and dispositional factors that are associated with false guilty pleas and exposure to crime/law media programmes. Results demonstrated that both students and community members underestimated the degree to which certain situational (e.g. attorney influence, saving money) and dispositional (e.g. age, compliance) factors can influence innocent defendants' decisions to plead guilty. Results also demonstrated that greater exposure to crime/law media programmes may help to increase public awareness about false guilty pleas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The plea discount (or trial penalty) refers to disparity in sentencing resulting from the decision to plead guilty or proceed to trial. It is often suggested that pleading guilty reduces one's odds of being imprisoned or reduces the length of one's sentence. While plea discounts haves been studied extensively in the United States, there is very little indication in Canada as to their existence or scope. Using data from the Integrated Criminal Court Survey (N = 2,198,954), this study analyzes logit-negative binomial hurdle models to study the plea discount in Canadian criminal courts and how it varies by court resource usage. It finds that the probability of being incarcerated is nominally higher after pleading guilty, but that pleading guilty reduces custodial sentence length. Further, it finds that the amount of resources used to resolve a case moderates the impact of a guilty plea in both situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A guilty plea wrongful conviction occurs when an innocent person pleads guilty to a crime that they did not commit. Canada's main procedural protection against guilty plea wrongful convictions is an inquiry, codified in sections 606(1.1) and (1.2) of the Criminal Code, that courts must conduct before accepting a plea from the accused. This plea inquiry requires that a court be satisfied of three conditions before accepting a guilty plea from an accused: (1) that the plea is voluntary, (2) that the plea is informed, and (3) that the facts support the charge. The goal of this article is to show that sections 606(1.1) and (1.2) offer insufficient protection against false guilty pleas and can be improved by learning from the early common law courts' approach to plea inquiries. This article argues that when sections 606(1.1) and (1.2) were enacted in 2002, guilty plea wrongful convictions were poorly understood and, as a result, Parliament crystalized a plea inquiry that systematically fails to account for many recently recognized causes of false guilty pleas. However, this article suggests that sections 606(1.1) and (1.2) can be improved by looking to the early common law, when courts were skeptical of guilty pleas and the risk of wrongful conviction. In particular, this article recommends three ways that sections 606(1.1) and (1.2) can be improved: (1) to conduct a full plea inquiry in every case, (2) to individualize the inquiry to the accused by considering their circumstances and motive for pleading guilty, and (3) to foster a skeptical attitude towards guilty pleas amongst the judiciary. This article further argues that these lessons can, at least in part, be implemented by challenging the constitutionality of sections 606(1.1) and (1.2) under section 7 of the Charter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Administrative Framework for Regulating Plea Dealing in India is provided by the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973. The enormous backlog of criminal cases and the growing number of prisoners being held on preliminary charges have both caused problems for the Indian criminal justice system. The slow, uncomfortable, and expensive preliminary technique typically results in an excessive delay in dismissing the criminal proceedings. In order to address the aforementioned issues, the criminal code was modified in 2005 to incorporate plea bargaining as a productive ADR strategy in India. This study aims to describe the development of plea bargaining in India's legal system as well as how it is applied in the criminal courts. In England, a guilty plea almost always results in a conviction. Innocent defendants may feel pressured to enter guilty pleas because the criminal court system provides strong incentives for them to do so. As a result, it's very much essential that the system of criminal justice has a robust appeals procedure designed to discover and overturn wrongful convictions following a plea of guilty... This research paper contends that, regrettably, it is improbable that this will occur given the present appeal mechanism and the Court of Appeal's attitude toward guilty pleas. Furthermore, it is claimed that the inability to address the possibility of erroneous conviction through a guilty plea is a contributing element in the contradiction and lack of clarity in the meaning set down to the guilty plea at different instances within the criminal justice process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the impact of the Ninth Circuit's decision in United States v. Goliday, 41 F.4th 778 (7th Cir. 2022), which introduced a heightened standard for accepting guilty pleas in drug conspiracy cases. Topics covered include the buyer-seller exception in drug conspiracy cases, the court's requirements for accepting guilty pleas in such cases, and the potential constraints on prosecutorial power and the fairness of plea bargaining resulting from this decision.

While commentators roundly condemn plea bargaining, the criticism can be as muddled as the practice itself. Critics' primary target is the "trial penalty." But a diferential between guilty-plea and trial sentences seems inevitable in any system that allows detkndants to concede guilt. And, as a new wave of "progressive prosecutors" is demonstrating, gaps between (unusually lenient) plea offers and long (potential) post-trial sentences are not only a strong incentive to plead guilty but also et powerful tool for reducing American penal severity. Other critiques point to.flaws that parallel those found in the broader system, overlooking that plea bargaining is typically a reflection of these flaws, not their source. Finding the traditional critiques lacking, this Article highlights uncertainty as the core problem with plea bargaining. It is easy to overlook uncertainty because analysis of plea bargains usually focuses on cases after they have been resolved. Yet from the perspective of someone accused of a crime who is deciding whether to plead guilty, uncertainty is key. And Mihile some uncertainty is inevitable, in many scenarios, plea bargaining turns the defendant's choice into something resembling a bet at a Las Vegas casinoa solemn spectacle of plea-bargaining roulette. Identifying uncertainty as plea bargaining's distinct contribution to American dysfunction is important for two reasons. First, it provides a realistic blueprint for improving the largely unregulated plea-bargaining process-this country's dominant mechanism for resolving criminal cases. Second, by suggesting that plea bargaining is not the primary source of other important problems. like excess severity or wrongful convictions, the analysis helps to redirect reform efforts targeting those important problems to areas where they may be more effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for Fifth Circuit in the case United States v. Johnlouis which established a new law enforcement functions test for determining whether potential government action falls within the ambit of the Fourth Amendment. It mentions Fifth Circuit's narrow holding will not prevent unpredictable and inequitable Fourth Amendment outcomes. It also mentions pled guilty to the conspiracy count and pursuant to his plea agreement.

The article aims to analyze the jurisprudence of the highest courts regarding the interpretation and application of guilt plea standards known in the United States of America as the "Alford" or "nolo contendere" pleas. In this regard, it will briefly present the special procedure of the guilty plea agreement, with a focus on the acknowledgment of guilt and the imputed offense by the defendants. Furthermore, it will present the elements of the aforementioned American procedures and recent relevant jurisprudence, followed by a conclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In March and September of 1711, in Carrickfergus, County Antrim, Ireland's last witch trials took place. Eighteen-year-old educated gentlewoman Mary Dunbar accused eight Presbyterian women and one man from Islandmagee and the surrounding areas of using witchcraft to attack her in spectral or spirit form and to summon demons to possess her body. The women were tried on 31 March 1711 at the Spring Session of Carrickfergus County Assize Court. Despite pleading not guilty, they were convicted under the 1586 Irish Witchcraft Act and sentenced to one year's imprisonment and four stints in the pillory. Unlike most demonically-possessed persons, the incarceration of the convicted witches did not improve Dunbar's health. Dunbar now claimed that William Sellor, husband and father to two of the convicted women, had begun bewitching her. William was convicted of witchcraft at the Summer Assizes in September 1711. Mary Dunbar however had died a few weeks earlier, just after the first trial, turning William's original offence into a capital crime for which he was probably executed: he was thus one of a possible two people executed in Ireland under a witchcraft Act. The story of the trial is told in Andrew Sneddon's book Possessed by the Devil: The Real History of The Islandmagee Witches and Ireland's Only Mass Witchcraft Trial (History Press, 2013). Along with Victoria McCollum, Sneddon now heads the Islandmagee Witches 1711 Project (w1711.org). The following discussion outlines the origins, aims and outputs of the project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

America's founding fathers believed jury trials to be a critical component of an orderly democracy. Yet, fewer than 5% of America's cases are decided by juries. We present an interdisciplinary review of empirical, legal, and historical literatures to highlight the significance of the disappearing trial. Without juries, direct participation in the justice system is severely limited, at a time when trust in governmental institutions is plummeting and highly publicized examples of systematic injustices are surging. Further, continued research on jury trials is critical for its practical implications and to address numerous fundamental psychological processes. The diminishment of the jury trial has been accompanied by a substantial increase in guilty pleas. The vast majority resulting from plea bargaining: a process that lacks the due process protections and transparency of trials. Furthermore, the increasing reliance on guilty pleas provides prosecutors with an immense amount of sentencing power—power once reserved for juries and judges. This dominant system of pleas poses a number of potential issues that are underscored throughout this paper. Ultimately, continued research on both adjudicative processes within the social sciences is critical to assuage the justice system to reverse its current trend toward the complete marginalization of the jury system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study follows 4715 Family Harm cases for which charges are laid (from around 15,000 events from 2018–2020). Comparisons are made between cases where a digitally recorded victim video statement (VVS) is taken to those who (1) make a written statement, (2) refuse to make any statement and (3) present at the public counter and make a written statement. Findings indicate that VVS increases the rates of an early guilty plea by 95% (OR = 1.95, LCL = 1.34, UCL = 2.7) compared to those who decline a VVS and have a written statement. No difference is observed for those presenting to report an event at a public counter. A more modest effect is observed comparing those who refuse a statement altogether (OR = 1.28, LCL = 1.03, UCL = 1.60). A VVS is nearly twice as likely to lead to an early guilty plea. It is reasoned that there is a poor rate of guilty pleas for written statements, rather than an elevation in rates for VVS. Age and gender are unrelated to the elevated rate of pleading guilty to a VVS. Event seriousness is inversely related to pleading guilty, whereas having many prior convictions or being remanded increases the likelihood of the guilty plea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2017, the Sentencing Council introduced a revised guideline for plea-based sentence reductions. The revisions were designed to provide greater certainty and to accelerate the timing of guilty pleas. Late pleas resulting in 'cracked trials' have long been a problem in the court system. The guideline was not intended to change the rate of defendants who plead guilty, but rather to increase the percentage of pleas entered early in the criminal process. This brief article reports findings from an analysis of data from the Crown Court before and after the introduction of the revised sentencing guideline. Findings reveal that the overall guilty plea remained stable over the period 2014–2019. The guideline appears to have had no effect on the timing of guilty pleas entered, and in fact the percentage of 'cracked' trials rose in the post-guideline period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Defendants can deny they have agency, and thus responsibility, for a crime by using a defense of mental impairment. We argue that although this strategy may help defendants evade blame, it may carry longer-term social costs, as lay people's perceptions of a person's agency might determine some of the moral rights they grant them. Three randomized between-group experiments (N = 1601) used online vignettes to examine lay perceptions of a hypothetical defendant using a defense of mental impairment (versus a guilty plea). We find that using a defense of mental impairment significantly reduces responsibility, blame, and punitiveness relative to a guilty plea, and these judgments are mediated by perceptions of reduced moral agency. However, after serving their respective sentences, those using the defense are sometimes conferred fewer rights, as reduced agency corresponds to an increase in perceived dangerousness. Our findings were found to be robust across different types of mental impairment, offences/sentences, and using both manipulated and measured agency. The findings have implications for defendants claiming reduced agency through legal defenses, as well as for the broader study of moral rights and mind perception. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the impediments to actualizing defendants' supposedly sacred constitutional right to meaningfully testify on their own behalf in the few cases that do proceed to trial. It mentions defendants' right to be heard at sentencing and the ways, particularly if the conviction was the result of a guilty plea. It also mentions back end of the criminal legal system and the limitations on incarcerated individuals' rights to crime of conviction.

In 2016, China instituted an "Admission of Guilt and Acceptance of Punishment" (plea leniency) system to formalize the legal system's approach to guilty pleas in criminal proceedings. To legitimize this new justice scheme, it decreed that every accused must be provided with access to legal representation to safeguard the voluntariness and accuracy of the plea. This article examines this mandatory defense counsel assistance and questions the extent to which Chinese lawyers comply with the legislative goal. Based on interviews with 34 lawyers who have served as defense attorneys in Shanghai, it is found that lawyers in plea leniency cases are essentially confined to three peripheral roles—"explainer," "persuader," and "observer." Instead of conducting earnest work in plea negotiations and legal counseling, Chinese lawyers often "collegially" cooperate with criminal justice agencies (gongjianfa 公检法) to urge the accused to admit they are guilty. The findings indicate that the state's paramount concern for efficiency inherently marginalizes counsel's bargaining position. Pragmatic considerations also influence the defense counsel's conduct: a desire to maintain a beneficial relationship with legal authorities and unwillingness to challenge the generally accusatory, draconian, and conviction-centered nature of Chinese criminal proceedings. Overall, plea leniency catalyzes a further emasculated role for lawyers, who function primarily as a mechanical constituent of the country's increasingly monotonous assembly-line version of criminal justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on Inotiv, a major U.S. animal supplier for research, receiving a record fine for neglecting hundreds of beagles at its subsidiary's facility in Virginia, leading to a guilty plea for violating the U.S. Animal Welfare Act.

The article focuses on the recent launch of a joint European and Japanese satellite, EarthCARE, aimed at studying how clouds and atmospheric particles impact the Earth's climate, particularly regarding air pollution's influence on cloud formation. It mentions the mission carries advanced instruments, including a laser probe and space-based Doppler radar, to provide high-resolution views of fine particles and track cloud motions.