Discount or Tax? A Real World Conceptualization of Plea Bargaining

• In Event: Prosecutorial Discretion, Guilty Pleas and Criminal Punishment

Abstract

This paper draws on qualitative field data from a multi-district study of federal courts to intervene in debates about whether negotiated plea deals are "bargains". I present findings from interview and observational data related to drug trafficking adjudication to argue that convictions at trial come with such high costs, and that benefits attending guilty pleas amount more to damage control than discounts so as to make the "bargain" illusory. More fundamentally, I question whether the punitive potential of law-on-the-books should be viewed as the starting metric for determining the cost/benefit calculus.

Author

• Mona Lynch, University of California, Irvine