A fellow former co-worker of mine spoke of an incident in which he got into some pretty serious legal trouble. He was young at the time, just out of high school.
When he went to see the judge to enter his plea, he said, “guilty.” However, the judge told him he was going to enter the plea as “not guilty.”
Why would the judge do that and did he have the right to do so?
Because the judge was going to find him not guilty and couldn’t do that if your friend plead guilty.
My state, Ohio permits a Judge to refuse to accept a Guilty plea under certain circumstances. You can check your state under the Rules of Criminal Procedure under the rule dealing with PLEAS.
When I was in my very early twenties, I wanted to plead guilty to some misdemeanor offense and pay the fine rather than hire a lawyer. The judge didn’t quite forbid it, but she strongly urged me to ask her for permission and time to find a lawyer first. The lawyer’s fee was well worth it as he was not only able to negotiate the fine down quite a bit but to arrange for me to pay it in installments.
But the guy ended up going to jail for what he did, albeit it was a relatively short sentence.
Depends on what else happened. He may have attempted to plead guilty at his arraignment without conferring with a lawyer first and the judge did not accept his ill advised plea. He may also have screwed up his plea hearing. In a felony, it’s usually necessary when pleading guilty to allocute or otherwise enter some sort of stipulation of evidence or judicial confession to the underlying offense. The judge may have asked him as part of the plea hearing if he was pleading guilty because he was in fact guilty, and he may have said something inconsistent with his guilty plea like “Well, I didn’t do it, but I don’t want to mess with it so I’ll just plead guilty and take the plea offer,” to which the judge replied “No, you will not. Your plea of guilt is rejected, the court will enter a plea of not guilty for you and you are now placed on the trial docket.”
Was the original guilty plea part of a bargain with the prosecutor? It’s possible that the judge was rejecting terms of the plea deal and not the guilty plea itself.
This is unlikely. What is far more likely is that the judge determined that the defendant was not fully informed about the charges against him and did not yet fully understand the consequences of pleading guilty, or that it was not yet obvious that the defendant was competent to stand trial or represent himself.
Hmm. Nevermind then. I have some relatives what had connections and were told to not plead guilty for that reason. My mistake.
I’ve often seen judges refuse to accept a guilty plea. Usually, it is because the person has not spoken with a lawyer; and consequently, may not understand the implications of what a guilty plea means. Fortunately, at our courthouses, there is always a “duty” lawyer standing by, so the person can consult with a lawyer at no charge. Often, the duty lawyer will temporarily represent the person, speaking on their behalf, as well as arguing for as light a sentence as possible. At any rate, judges around here generally will not accept a guilty plea unless the person has spoken with a lawyer.
This.
The judge wants to be sure the defendant really understands what he is doing and why. If you plead guilty with something like “I didn’t do it but I ant to get this out of the way” the judge is effectively saying “what I am really hearing you say is you are not guilty”. In order to get a real, fair trial - at least talk to a lawyer first.
In my big-city muni court, I will not accept uncounselled guilty pleas at arraignment (first court appearance, when the defendant is advised of the charge[s] and his or her rights) for jailable offenses; the defendant either gets a continuance to speak to a lawyer, or a not guilty plea. Now and then I won’t accept a guilty plea from someone who, when given the chance to explain what happened or speak in mitigation, ends up denying guilt. I will also enter not guilty pleas for those who refuse to enter any plea at all (such as tax protester/sovereign American citizen/militia types) to preserve their rights.
When I was a felony prosecutor, I once had a judge refuse to accept a guilty plea following a plea agreement; she thought the state was being too generous. Defendant hurriedly conferred with his lawyer and pled to an additional charge, which the judge accepted. That happened only once in six years, though.
Thats pretty much what I have seen in a different jurisdiction. Every now and then I see recreational outrage from the public about an obviously guilty defendant pleading not guilty at arraignment. They don’t realize that the plea is pretty much automatic and doesn’t reflect what might happen later.
I run into this quite frequently, I prosecute in 4 municipalities and the judges require a statement to establish a factual basis for the plea. If a defendant tries to minimize or excuse to the point that he or she doesn’t elecute an element of the crime, the judge rejects the plea.
By the way, in all of the misdemeanor courts I practice as a prosecutor and defense attorney, the vast majority of defendant’s plea without consulting an attorney. If they speak to any attorney, more than a third want to speak to the prosecutor before the initial appearance. We remind them of the right to remain siloent, but they still want to get a deal before arraignment (which also frequently happens).
What state, if you’re willing to say? And do you deal with jailable offenses?
Similarly, the way I’ve seen things work here is, once the defendant pleads guilty, a statement of the facts is read (sometimes by the defence attorney, as it happens.) The judge asks the defendant whether s/he agrees with the facts as presented, whether s/he is pleading guilty freely and with no promises or threats, and whether s/he understands that the judge will have to impose a sentence. Once those items are dealt with, the judge then announces that s/he accepts the defendant’s guilty plea.
Sometimes the defendant doesn’t agree with the facts as read, and then it’s necessary to work out whether the inconsistency is important or not. If it is, the judge does not accept the guilty plea.
Note that this answer is relevant to the Swedish law system, which is not a Common Law system but is based on Civil Law.
Here the judge’s panel may refuse a guilty plea. One typical reason is where the judges suspect that the guilty plea is not in earnest, for example in order to protect another individual.
Years back after a traffic citation that was bogus and mandatory court I sat and watched a bunch of others plead and all the not guilty were given the next date to appear and I was about 5 days left before moving back home, so I plead “Guilty”.
Then came the same question all others were also asked, Are you pleading Guilty because you are or because of another reason and being as I just finished schooling to become a LEO I of course had to be honest and said that the $20.00 fine was much preferred to coming back being I was moving out within days.
I was told that I could not plead guilty under those circumstances. Trial was set for that day.
Then after bringing in the ticket writer on his day off, and I had poster boards drawn up to prove my case, the prosecutor then mover to dismiss!!
I objected and found I couldn’t. Case closed with a very P.O’ed Cop.
But the system takes money every day from those that pay tickets instead of taking the case to the judge. Much cheaper to pay a ticket instead of sitting all day on the bench waiting your turn to plead.
There was a recent thread on the sdubject of guilty pleas in which someone outlined that a judge in some jurisdictions needs to ask and have answered a set of allocutions aimed at etaqblishing fgor the record that the pleader is aware of the consequences of his action and is willingly giving up certain rights (e.g., to trial).
why were you objecting when the Prosecutor moved to dismiss the case?