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Plea bargaining is a significant part of the criminal justice system in the United States; the vast majority (roughly 90%) [29] of criminal cases in the United States are settled by plea bargain rather than by a jury trial. [30] Plea bargains are subject to the approval of the court, and different states and jurisdictions have different rules.
The theoretical work based on the prisoner's dilemma is one reason why, in many countries, plea bargaining is forbidden. Often, precisely the prisoner's dilemma scenario applies: it is in the interest of both suspects to confess and testify against the other suspect, irrespective of the innocence of the accused.
Today, Mnookin and Kornhauser's 1979 article is widely recognized as a landmark article "which legitimized the study of negotiation within the legal academy" by "tethering bargaining to jurisprudence". [4] A 2012 study determined that as of that year, it was the nineteenth most-cited law review article of all time. [5]
In a plea bargain, a defendant makes a deal with the prosecution or court to plead guilty in exchange for a more lenient punishment, or for related charges against them to be dropped. A "blind plea" is a guilty plea entered with no plea agreement in place. [3] Plea bargains are particularly common in the United States. [4]
In short, plea bargains outside the law's shadow depend on prosecutors' ability to make credible threats of severe post-trial sentences. Sentencing guidelines make it easy to issue those threats." [24] The federal guilty plea rate has risen from 83% in 1983 to 96% in 2009, [25] a rise attributed largely to the Sentencing Guidelines.
In a plea agreement reached with Washington state prosecutors, Gary Ridgway, a Seattle-area man who admitted to 48 murders since 1982, accepted a sentence of life in prison without parole in 2003. Prosecutors spared Ridgway from execution in exchange for his cooperation in leading police to the remains of still-missing victims.
A nolo contendere plea has the same immediate effects as a plea of guilty, but may have different residual effects or consequences in future actions. For instance, a conviction arising from a nolo contendere plea is subject to any and all penalties, fines, and forfeitures of a conviction from a guilty plea in the same case, and can be considered as an aggravating factor in future criminal actions.
In United States law, an Alford plea, also called a Kennedy plea in West Virginia, [1] an Alford guilty plea, [2] [3] [4] and the Alford doctrine, [5] [6] [7] is a guilty plea in criminal court, [8] [9] [10] whereby a defendant in a criminal case does not admit to the criminal act and asserts innocence, but accepts imposition of a sentence.