Guilty Plea Research Articles

Legal Briefs

Former frat leaders plead guilty in pledge hazing death Drexel University resolves civil rights investigation Felony charge for activist who glitter‐bombed Harvard president Penn State settles lawsuit with former fencer

GUILTY PLEAS THROUGH SPECIAL CHANNELS AS AN EFFORT TO REFORM CRIMINAL PROCEDURE LAW IN INDONESIA

This research discusses the concept of setting up a guilty plea through special channels as an effort to reform criminal procedure law in Indonesia in relation to the principles of simple, fast and low cost justice. Focusing on efforts to reform criminal procedure law in Indonesia and associated with the principles of simple, fast and low cost justice, namely with the concept of Guilty Plea Arrangements through Special Paths that exist in the renewal of the Indonesian criminal procedure code. The method used in this research is normative research. The result of this research is that the special route is an effort in the renewal of criminal procedure law. By eliminating some of the evidentiary processes, the special track is considered to accelerate case handling, thus reflecting the principles of simple, fast, and low cost justice. The special path contained in article 199 of the draft criminal procedure code does not need to be included in the Indonesian Criminal Procedure Code because there is ambiguity that makes the special path require reassessment before being applied to Indonesian criminal justice.

Lived experiences of bias in compensation and reintegration associated with false admissions of guilt.

Some exonerees receive compensation and aid after being exonerated of their wrongful convictions, and some do not. Looking beyond differences in state statutes, we examined possible reasons for biases in receiving compensation (via statutes or civil claims) and other reintegration services. More specifically, we examined how two unique types of false admission of guilt (i.e., false confessions and false guilty pleas) could be associated with biased outcomes in compensation procurement and reintegration outcomes. Although we did not have formal hypotheses for this qualitative study, based on the cumulative disadvantage framework (Scherr, Redlich, & Kassin, 2020), we anticipated that both types of false admission of guilt would negatively bias exonerees' experience post-exoneration. More specifically, we expected that exonerees whose cases involved at least one type of false admission of guilt would have a more difficult time obtaining compensation and would experience more negative post-exoneration outcomes, compared with exonerees in general. We conducted in-depth interviews with three samples: (a) exonerees (n = 19), (b) attorneys who had assisted exonerees with post-exoneration compensation claims (n = 15), and (c) innocence advocates who had worked with exonerees (n = 9). Across all samples, interviewees indicated that both forms of false admission of guilt are associated with biases that may influence exonerees' compensation and reintegration efforts. Specifically, interviews revealed that (a) false admissions are associated with disadvantages to exonerees' compensation and reintegration efforts, as predicted by the cumulative disadvantage framework; (b) under specific circumstances, false admissions are associated with advantages benefiting compensation attempts; and (c) false admissions can be nonapplicable (i.e., irrelevant) to reintegration efforts. Together, our findings provide a more nuanced understanding of the role false confessions and false guilty pleas may play post-exoneration. This understanding, derived from those individuals directly involved in the compensation and reintegration processes, is an important step in beginning to right the injustices experienced by those wrongfully convicted. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

"… give me a lawyer, dawg": recognizing youthful pleas for advice and support.

(1) Youth are particularly vulnerable to making suboptimal legal decisions due to added challenges in comprehension, as well as their ongoing neurological development. (2) This fact is especially problematic in our system of pleas, which frequently expects defendants to determine the outcome of their own cases (by accepting or rejecting plea offers). (3) To better ensure that guilty pleas entered by youthful defendants are indeed knowing, intelligent, and voluntary, legal counsel should be mandatory during any and all juvenile criminal proceedings. (4) Further, an additional "translator" (similar to a guardian ad litem), who has specialized training in developmental psychology, should be present to effectively counsel and support youth defendants who might otherwise fail to comprehend the advice of their attorneys (and other court actors).

Julian Assange Pleads Guilty to One Charge of Espionage and Returns to Australia, Ending U.S. Attempts to Extradite Him

Julian Assange Pleads Guilty to One Charge of Espionage and Returns to Australia, Ending U.S. Attempts to Extradite Him

"This Time It Was Different:" Creating a Multidisciplinary, Trauma-Informed, Victim-Centered Approach to Sexual Assault Cold Case Investigations and Prosecutions.

Police and prosecutors recommend that sexual assault survivors have a medical forensic exam and the collection of a sexual assault kit (SAK; also known as a "rape kit") to preserve biological evidence (e.g., semen, blood, saliva, hair) if they want to pursue criminal prosecution. However, law enforcement personnel do not routinely submit SAKs to crime laboratories for forensic DNA testing. Instead, they often place untested kits in storage and close many of these reported cases after minimal investigation. Current estimates indicate there are 300,000 to 400,000 untested SAKs in law enforcement agencies throughout the United States. In response to this national problem, the U.S. Department of Justice created the Sexual Assault Kit Initiative (SAKI) Project to support kit testing, re-investigation, and prosecution of these "cold case" sexual assaults. The SAKI program also provides training and technical assistance to police, prosecutors, and victim advocates on how to use a multidisciplinary, trauma-informed, and victim-centered approach in cold case prosecutions. This study examined the extent to which one SAKI-funded site implemented these three guiding principles in their interactions with victims while prosecuting cold case sexual assaults. We conducted semistructured qualitative interviews with N = 32 sexual assault survivors from the first cohort of cold cases that were re-opened and prosecuted in this jurisdiction. Nearly all cases (n = 31) ended in a guilty plea or trial conviction, and the vast majority of survivors indicated that they had positive experiences with the SAKI team. Survivors noted that they were listened to, believed, supported, and well-prepared by a multidisciplinary team of practitioners who were personally invested in their cases and in their well-being. Implications for creating multidisciplinary, trauma-informed, and victim-centered approaches with other communities are discussed.

Briefs

Former frat leaders plead guilty in pledge hazing death Drexel University resolves civil rights investigation Felony charge for activist who glitter‐bombed Harvard president Campus police chief, others leave jobs after campus double murder

Virginia Alford plea-takers experience harsher outcomes than traditional plea-takers.

Alford pleas allow defendants to profess innocence while simultaneously pleading guilty. In Study 1, we addressed two research questions: (1) Does the case processing length in Alford plea cases differ from traditional guilty plea cases? and (2) Do the sentencing outcomes (i.e., length of sentence, reduction in sentence, incarceration) in Alford plea cases differ from traditional guilty plea cases? In Study 2, we explored two research questions: (1) What is the process for offering, negotiating, and accepting Alford pleas? and (2) How does the strength of evidence compare in Alford plea cases versus traditional guilty plea cases? In Study 1, we predicted that (a) Alford plea cases would take longer to dispose of than traditional guilty plea cases, and (b) Alford plea cases would receive more beneficial sentencing outcomes (e.g., shorter sentences, larger sentence reductions) than traditional guilty plea cases. The research questions in Study 2 were exploratory; thus, we did not have a priori hypotheses. Study 1 is a quantitative analysis of 18 years of Virginia court administrative data, and Study 2 is a qualitative analysis of interviews with Virginia judges, prosecutors, and defense attorneys. In Study 1, we found that Alford plea cases take longer to process and generally receive harsher, less favorable outcomes compared with traditional guilty pleas. In Study 2, we found that legal actors do not perceive evidence to be a driving factor in the context of Alford pleas and largely do not consider Alford pleas differently from traditional guilty pleas. Additional research would be beneficial to ensure that defendants are not punished simply for insisting on their innocence. Given that almost all convictions are the result of guilty pleas, some entered without admissions of guilt, increased scholarship on traditional and Alford pleas is essential. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Research on the Duty Lawyer's Function of Effective Advocacy in Misdemeanor Cases of Guilty Plea

In the era of misdemeanour, the contradiction between the increasing number of misdemeanour cases and the limited judicial resources is prominent. In order to realize the goal of diverging complex and simple cases and reducing the burden of prosecution, the role of guilty plea system in the management of misdemeanour should be fully brought into play. There are many problems in effective defense of on-duty lawyers in guilty plea cases in China. The position of on-duty lawyers is "a witness", the performance guarantee of on-duty lawyers is insufficient, and the supervision mechanism of on-duty lawyers is missing. In the future, China needs to clarify the functional positioning of duty lawyers, adjusts the provisions on duty lawyers' involvement time, litigation rights and defense duties, and improve the supervision mechanism of duty lawyers' performance.

When Pleas Precede Evidence

In most U.S. jurisdictions, prosecutors are not required to clearly establish a reasonable basis for guilt prior to offering defendants plea deals. We apply Bayesian analyses, which are uniquely suited to illuminate the impact of prior probability of guilt on the informativeness of a particular outcome (i.e., a guilty plea), to demonstrate the risks of plea offers that precede evidence. Our primary prediction was that lower prior probabilities of guilt would coincide with a significantly higher risk­­ for false guilty pleas. We incorporated data from Wilford, Sutherland et al. (2021) into a Bayesian analysis allowing us to model the expected diagnosticity of plea acceptance across the full range of prior probability of guilt. Our analysis indicated that, as predicted, when plea offers are accepted at lower prior probabilities of guilt, the probability that a plea is actually false is significantly higher than when prior probabilities of guilt are higher. In other words, there is a trade-off between prior probability of guilt and information gain. For instance, in our analysis, when prior probability of guilt was 50%, posterior probability of guilt (after a plea) was 77.8%; when prior probability of guilt was 80%, posterior probability of guilt was 93.3%. Our results clearly indicate the importance of ensuring that there is a reasonable basis for guilt before a plea deal is extended. In the absence of shared discovery, no such reasonable basis can be established. Further, these results illustrate the additional insights gained from applying a Bayesian approach to plea-decision contexts.

Wrongful Conviction in Texas: ‘Sex Assaults’, False Guilty Pleas, Stranger Rape with Misidentification, and Drug Offenses

Abstract Citing IP data, Johnson (2021), reported that sexual assault/rape was the most common offense associated with exoneration in the US. Also, stranger rape accounted for 72% of the entire IP database. To further examine the role of sexual assault, the current study examined all exonerations in Texas, the US state with the most sexual assault exonerations. Using NRE data, descriptive analyses, and reclassifying sexual assaults, we find drug offenses are the most common crime type associated with exonerations in Texas but sexual assault/rape accounts for a significant portion of Texas exonerations. Contrary to a common assumption, we also find that exculpatory DNA does not explain the substantial proportion of sexual assaults among exonerations. We also examine the role of stranger rape misidentification, youthful complainant recantations (perjury/false allegations) and false guilty pleas in the NRE Texas database. Finally, we discuss other patterns within the Texas exonerations and policy implications. Keywords: Rape, Exoneration, Misidentification, Pleas

The Psychology of Guilty Plea Decisions

The Psychology of Guilty Plea Decisions

Leveraging video evidence in domestic violence misdemeanour cases: Examination of case dispositions and case length

Abstract Law enforcement has used video recording devices (e.g. dash camera, body-worn camera) for more than 40 years, with body-worn cameras emerging in 2005 as a policing tool. However, little is known regarding how video evidence is leveraged in case decision-making and outcomes for domestic violence. Law enforcement may use cameras to enhance evidence collection in domestic violence cases, take statements from victims, witnesses, and offenders, record injuries and damages, and document the administration of risk/injury assessments. Preliminary research has indicated video evidence may have strong evidentiary value in domestic violence cases, however, has rarely controlled for other contributing factors. This study furthers our knowledge by examining how video evidence taken by law enforcement impacts case outcomes and length of time to disposition in a sample of closed, misdemeanour domestic violence cases within a large county in a southwestern state. A random sample of cases (n = 612) with and without video evidence were examined for differences in case disposition and case length. Additional evidentiary factors and case characteristics are considered such as prior criminal charges, victim–offender relationship, presence of non-video evidence, presence of witnesses, and gender of offender. Analyses indicate significant differences, such that cases with video evidence are associated with increased guilty pleas, increased convictions, and less time to closure/final case disposition. Findings have implications for the use of video evidence in strengthening the criminal justice response to domestic violence incidents in combination with other case factors.

Do Activists Prioritize Solutions Over Grievances? A Twitter Study of Black Lives Matter

Do social movements shift the focus of their framing from grievances to tactics as they mature? This paper examines the nature of the frames that social movements and activists co-create using the case of Black Lives Matter (BLM). Building on (Snow & Benford, 1988), we explore whether BLM’s frames have evolved from diagnostic to prognostic frames since the movement’s emergence. We compiled a novel tweet dataset collected from Twitter that contains 269,963 tweets sent under the hashtag “BlackLivesMatter” from Jan. 01, 2020, to Dec. 31, 2021. Using time series and network analysis, we show that frames do not naturally evolve from diagnostic to prognostic frames as movements mature. We find that BLM activists increasingly use prognostic frames while expressing their grievances because injustices and discrimination toward the Black continue. The evidence suggests that tweets on tactics and solutions outnumber the grievance-related frames only after Chauvin’s guilty plea alleviates grievances.

Issues of Improving the Order of Special Proceedings in Cases of the Consent of the Accused with the Charges

The author analyses some conditions for the application of a special trial procedure in cases when the accused agrees with the charges. The author also criticizes the opinion of those scholars who deny the necessity of including the guilty plea in the list of such conditions. It is argued that the consent with the prosecution as required by law cannot possibly be imagined without a guilty plea. The author examines the opinions of scholars regarding the practical implementation of the duty of the court to verify if the charge is supported by the necessary aggregate of evidence in a criminal case, in connection with which the importance of preparation to a court hearing is stressed. Using the theoretical analysis of doctrinal ideas on the due procedural mechanism of a special order of a court decision, the author makes specific recommendations on its improvement to ensure an objective and substantiated conviction.

Navigating criminal sanctions through a plea of guilty or not in Ghana: the perspective of prison inmates

Navigating criminal sanctions through a plea of guilty or not in Ghana: the perspective of prison inmates

Mapping Restorative Justice for Green Crime Offenders: An Empirical Study of Sentencing Outcomes in China

ABSTRACT Restorative justice (RJ) has attracted significant attention from academia and the criminal justice system across civil society, yet studies that incorporate RJ factors to explain criminal sanction results remain scarce. This study utilizes the precision matching approach to examine sentencing outcomes for green offenses and tests the assumption that green offenders with RJ measures receive more leniency in court than those without RJ. Our findings reveal that most types of green crimes with the involvement of RJ, except for illegal mining have obtained less severe sanction results to a varied degree in terms of probation incidence and lengths of incarceration. By comparison, we also find that the judge might consider reduce penalties when the offender has a guilty plea with or without restorative justice activities (RJA). Additionally, there is a tendency to apply RJ to cases with less severe offenses, and the offenders with RJA seem to be more convincing than those surrendering themselves for shorter sentences. The results provide more empirical evidence for the impacts of RJ intervention on criminal sanctions and also raise concerns about the particularity and discretion of incorporating RJ in the context of green criminology.

Regspraak: Appeal will not remedy a guilty plea presented for the wrong reasons

Met aankoms op die Hosea Kutako Internasionale Lughawe in Windhoek, Namibië verskaf twee senior advokate van die Johannesburg balie vals inligting aan die immigrasiepersoneel van die buurland oor die rede vir hul besoek aan die land. Die eerste appellant het aangedui dat hy die land wil binnekom vir ’n besoek, terwyl die tweede appellant aangedui het dat hy ’n vergadering kom bywoon. Beide se oogmerk was egter om Namibiese kliënte in ’n borgaansoek in die landdroshof te verteenwoordig. Op grond van hul mededelings is besoekerspermitte aan beide uitgereik. Beide appellante is die volgende dag by die landdroshof waar hulle namens kliënte wou verskyn, gearresteer. Met hul verskyning laat dieselfde Vrydagmiddag in die Windhoek landdroshof, pleit beide appellante skuldig op twee aanklagte van oortreding van artikels 29(5) en 54(e) van die Namibiese Immigration Control Act 7 van 1993. Beide word na behore deur die landdros ondervra ingevolge artikel 112(1)(b) van die Strafproseswet 51 van 1977 en ná skuldigbevinding gevonnis tot betaling van boetes met gevangenisstraf as alternatief. Die appellante appelleer teen die skuldigbevindings en vonnisse na die Namibiese hoë hof en ná afwysing van die appèl, na die hooggeregshof. Die eerste grond van appèl handel oor die interpretasie van artikel 29(5) van die Immigration Control Act. Die appellante voer aan dat ’n enkele verskyning in ’n borgaansoek nie aangemerk kan word as die bedryf van ’n professie as advokaat soos bedoel in die immigrasiewetgewing nie. As sodanig sou na bewering ’n besoekerspermit voldoende wees en sou ’n werkpermit nie vereis word om die land binne te kom om in slegs ’n enkele saak te verskyn nie. As tweede grond is aangevoer dat beide appellante in besit was van ’n sertifikaat uitgereik deur die Namibiese hoofregter waarin toestemming ingevolge artikel 85(2) van die Legal Practitioners Act 15 van 1995 verleen is vir hul verskyning in die Namibiese hof. Die appellante versoek dat die skuldigbevindings en vonnisse ter syde gestel word en die aangeleentheid na die landdroshof terugverwys word vir ’n de novo verhoor. Die appellante dui aan dat hulle skuldig gepleit het vanweë druk wat uit die omringende omstandighede ontstaan het en veral weens vrees dat hulle oor die naweek in hegtenis aangehou sou word. Die hoogste hof dui aan dat die artikel 85(2)-sertifikaat nooit aan die landdroshof voorgelê is nie en dat die hof van appèl nie geregtelik kennis kan neem van die bestaan daarvan nie. Die hof verwerp ook die appellante se betoog dat die landdros onreëlmatig, onbillik en onkonstitusioneel teenoor hulle gehandel het. Uit die uitsprake van die twee howe van appèl blyk dit dat die appellante bewus was van die interpretasie wat die Namibiese immigrasiebeamptes heg aan die betrokke immigrasiewetgewing en dat daar vereis sou word dat die appellante vooraf aansoek moes doen vir werkpermitte. Ten spyte van hierdie besef het die appellante doelbewus wanvoorstellings aan die immigrasiebeamptes gedoen en op sterkte van besoekerspermitte en sertifikate uitgereik deur die hoofregter voortgegaan om hul kliënte te verteenwoordig. Met hul arrestasie op oortreding van die immigrasiewetgewing is die appellante uiteraard as verbode immigrante in hegtenis geneem en aangehou. Die keuse was in die oë van die twee aangehoudenes om óf die vertolking van die immigrasiewetgewing in die hof te laat toets by wyse van ’n verhoor óf om skuldig te pleit en die aangeleentheid sodoende spoedig af te handel. Aangesien daar uiteraard geen waarborg kon wees vir die tydperk van aanhouding in hegtenis vir die duur van ’n verhoor nie, het die appellante besluit om die laaste uitweg te volg en die aangeleentheid daarna op appèl te probeer beredder. Hierdie benoude spronge het egter geen byval gevind in enige van die appèlhowe nie en die appèlle is tereg van die hand gewys.

Research on the leading position of procuratorial organs in the process of applying the leniency system of guilty plea

Research on the leading position of procuratorial organs in the process of applying the leniency system of guilty plea

On the Sentencing Suggestion Right of the Procuratorate in the System of Guilty Plea

On the Sentencing Suggestion Right of the Procuratorate in the System of Guilty Plea