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Types and Processes of Plea Bargaining

 

            Plea bargaining is a process in which a person who is accused of a crime is allowed to say the he or she is guilty of a less serious crime in order to be given a less severe punishment. [Mer15] It is the process of negotiating a reduced charge for a defendant with the prosecutor if the defendant pleads guilty to the charges. Plea bargains can also be used to take down larger criminal activity, by negotiating a lighter sentence for the "pawns" in the crime if they are willing to testify to the crimes of the "Mastermind." In 2002, one of the world's largest long-distance telephone companies, WorldCom, announced that its accounting practices had been fraudulent. [Joh06] In this case, two board members struck deals with the prosecutor in order for the prosecution to gain evidence and testimonies against the Chairman that was behind the fraudulent activity. Plea Bargains have helped put away many people who would have not been convicted if not for testimonies of recipients of the plea bargain. .
             Plea bargains are a great asset to the criminal justice system in the battle against organized crime. Unlike other criminal activity organized crime is almost like a corporation, there is a main boss and then employees, the boss is usually not directly involved in any crime. The boss leads and directs the pawns to do the dirty work while the boss is safely far away from where the crime is happening to have deniability of the criminal activities should the pawns be caught. Plea bargains have enabled the pawns to get lighter sentences for small crimes such as robbery, in order to bring down the boss for larger crimes which will in turn prevent other crimes from being committed. Plea Bargains bring a lot of controversy because they do allow criminals to get a lighter sentence and many people believe that it is unjust for them to get off with the lighter sentence, but without the support of plea bargains certain types of criminal activities can continue to operate, the boss would have recruited another pawn and the crimes would continue.


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