Research Handbook On Plea Bargaining And Criminal Justice

Bringing together established and emerging scholars from around the world, the Research Handbook on Plea Bargaining and Criminal Justice examines the practice of plea bargaining, through which guilty pleas are secured and trials are avoided.

This Handbook presents innovative research that compares different criminal procedure systems by focusing on the mechanisms by which legal systems seek to avoid error, protect rights, ground their legitimacy, expand lay participation in the criminal process and develop alternatives to criminal trials, such as plea bargaining, as well as alternatives to the criminal process as a whole, such as intelligence operations. The criminal procedures examined in this book include those of the United States, Germany, France, Spain, Russia, India, Latin America, Taiwan and Japan, among others.

This book explores victims’ views of plea negotiations and the level of input that they desire. It draws on the empirical findings of the first in-depth study of victims and plea negotiations conducted in Australia. Over the last 50 years, the criminal justice system has seen major changes in both the role that victims play in the justice process and in how the vast majority of criminal cases are finalised. Guilty pleas have become the norm, and many of these result from negotiations between the prosecutor and the defence. The extent to which the victim is one of the participating parties in plea negotiations however, is a question of law and of practice. Drawing from focus groups and surveys with victims of crime, Victims and Plea Negotiations seeks to privilege victims’ voices and lived experiences of plea negotiations, to present their perspectives on five options for enhanced participation in this legal process. This book appeals to academics and students in the areas of law, criminology, sociology, victimology and legal studies, those who practice in the criminal justice system generally, those who work with victims, and policy makers.

Jeremy Bentham and Gary Becker established the tradition of analyzing criminal law in utilitarian and economic terms. This seminal book continues that tradition with specially commissioned, original papers that span the philosophical foundations of the use of economics in criminal law, both traditional economic perspectives and behavioral and experimental approaches to the discipline. The contributors examine and evaluate the optimal design of criminal law norms as well as the ideal structure of law enforcement institutions. They delineate what wrongs ought to be criminalized, identify the boundaries between criminal law and tort, and determine the optimal size of sanctions given the differential vulnerability of victims. They also analyze the special considerations that apply to the regulation of corporate crime, the effects of technology on crime, and the effects of the distribution of wealth on sentencing. This essential Handbook provides students and scholars of criminal law and law and economics the opportunity to explore the diversity of contemporary approaches to the economics of crime. Criminologists, sociologists and policymakers will also find it a valuable addition to their collections.

The power of the modern prosecutor arises from several features of the criminal justice landscape: widespread use of law and order political rhetoric and heightened fear of crime among voters; legislatures' embrace of extreme sentencing ranges to respond to such concerns; and the uncertain or limited accountability of prosecutors to the electorate, the bar, or other political and professional constituencies. The convergence of these trends has transformed prosecution into an indispensable field of study. This volume brings together the work of leading international scholars across criminology, sociology, political science, and law - along with contributions from reform-minded practitioners - to examine a variety of issues in prosecutorial behaviour and the institutional structures that frame their behavior. The Handbook connects the dots among existing theoretical and empirical research related to prosecutors. Major sections of the volume cover (1) prosecutor performance during distinct phases of a criminal case, (2) the features of the prosecutor's environment, both inside the office and external to the office, that influence the choices of individual prosecutors and office leaders, and (3) prosecutorial strategies and priorities when dealing with specialized types of crimes, victims, and defendants. Taken together, the chapters in this volume identify the founding texts, discuss leading theoretical and methodological approaches, explain the scope of unresolved issues, and preview where this field is headed. The volume provides a bottom-up view of an important new scholarly field.

Despite a popular view that trials are the focal point of the criminal justice process, in reality, the most frequent way a criminal matter resolves is not through a fiercely fought battle between state and defendant, but instead through a process of negotiation between the prosecution and defence, resulting in a defendant pleading guilty in exchange for agreed concessions from the prosecution. This book presents an original empirical case-study of plea negotiations drawing upon interviews with legal actors and an analysis of defence practitioner case files, to shine light on the processes and ways in which an agreed outcome is reached in criminal prosecutions, within the setting of a jurisdiction, like many others world-wide, which is suffering major shifts in state resources. Plea negotiations, also referred to as “plea bargaining”, “negotiated guilty pleas” and “negotiated resolutions” are neither an alloyed benefit nor a detriment for defendants, victims or the criminal justice system generally, and like all compromises, this book shows how the perfect “justice” outcome gives way to the good, or just the reasonably acceptable justice outcome.

A comprehensive and accesible overview of the operation of the American criminal justice system. This handbook's extensive coverage of the criminal justice system in the U.S. makes it an important reference for students and scholars in criminal justice, law, and public policy.

Betrayal of Due Process is a landmark study of the criminal justice systems of two common-law nations, the United States and Canada. By focusing on plea bargaining, which is one of the most dominant practices in the criminal justice system of both countries, Nasheri makes a historical comparison of guilty plea practices and ideologies. She draws on historical, criminological, sociological, and political perspectives to construct her argument. Because plea bargaining is a crucial part of the criminal justice system yet has received little scholarly attention, this much-needed book fills a wide gap in legal scholarship.