# Why are plea deals so good? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 28, 2015, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800 "2015-11-28T03:43:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![bomberswarm2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c37758/32.png) [@bomberswarm2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bomberswarm2)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/1 "2015-11-28T03:43:21Z")
On L&O SVU, the ADAs are always offering plea deals of Murder 1 to Man 2. Why not Man 1 or even better, Murder 2? And why do they always plead out cases they are certain to win? Does this happen in real life? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/2 "2015-11-28T04:02:13Z")
Prosecutors only have a limited pool of resources and a full trial takes a lot more than a plea bargain. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/3 "2015-11-28T04:03:31Z")
> [@bomberswarm2](#): > > On L&O SVU, the ADAs are always offering plea deals of Murder 1 to Man 2. Why not Man 1 or even better, Murder 2? And why do they always plead out cases they are certain to win? Does this happen in real life? If the prosecutor’s case is weak, why would the defendant want to take a deal? ---
**Author:** ![wolfman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a8b319/32.png) [@wolfman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfman)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/4 "2015-11-28T04:06:12Z")
As long as human jurors are involved there is no such thing as certain to win. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/5 "2015-11-28T04:31:45Z")
> [@bomberswarm2](#): > > On L&O SVU, the ADAs are always offering plea deals of Murder 1 to Man 2. Why not Man 1 or even better, Murder 2? And why do they always plead out cases they are certain to win? Does this happen in real life? In real life, yes, the vast majority of cases end in plea bargains. (In my state, only around ten percent of felony convictions are the result of trials; the remainder are guilty pleas, and in the majority of cases the prosecutor has given up something to obtain that plea.) Why? No prosecutor’s office in the country has the money and staff to take ten times as many cases to trial, nor are there sufficient courts to hold all of those trials before speedy-trial rules and statutes of limitations rendered the cases unwinnable. ---
**Author:** ![Habeed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a587f6/32.png) [@Habeed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Habeed)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/6 "2015-11-28T05:47:42Z")
> [@friedo](#): > > If the prosecutor’s case is weak, why would the defendant want to take a deal? Because what would you rather face : a 30% or 50% chance that 12 random people are too stupid to see that the prosecution is full of it (realize that from the perspective of ordinary people, they are going to enter the jury box with the assumption that policemen tell the truth and that the defendant is guilty) and decades in prison if they find you guilty? Or a guaranteed 5 years, with early release in 3, or something. Sure, it’s awful - but I think a 20 or 30 year prison sentence is de facto the death penalty. You’ll be so old by the time they release you that you won’t be able to do anything before it’s time to die, because you have the weight of the conviction hanging off you and you’re already 60 or something. No social security since you couldn’t work. Nobody in their right mind will ever date or marry you. And, if you get sick in prison, the prison will in many cases make every effort to welch on paying for medical care so that you die from your illness. And, they won’t lift a finger to stop other prisoners from infecting you with Hepatitis C, and once you get it, they will do their best to avoid paying for the treatment. And if you aren’t a badass, able to make other prisoners think you are psychotic and a millimeter from killing someone, other prisoners will assault and rape you. Complain to the prison officials, and they will torture you for your protection (lock you in solitary). I think that if a prosecutor comes in the interview room with an offer like this - “take a guaranteed 5 years or I will ask the judge for 30”, I see no actual difference between this verbal statement and if the prosecutor took out a revolver, stuck a few bullets in it, turned the wheel, and put the revolver to your head. “sign here or I pull the trigger.” This is why something like 90% of defendants take a plea, and of the ones who refuse, like 60% of those are convicted. ---
**Author:** ![bomberswarm2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c37758/32.png) [@bomberswarm2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bomberswarm2)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 7:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/7 "2015-11-28T07:23:48Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > In real life, yes, the vast majority of cases end in plea bargains. (In my state, only around ten percent of felony convictions are the result of trials; the remainder are guilty pleas, and in the majority of cases the prosecutor has given up something to obtain that plea.) > > Why? No prosecutor’s office in the country has the money and staff to take ten times as many cases to trial, nor are there sufficient courts to hold all of those trials before speedy-trial rules and statutes of limitations rendered the cases unwinnable. OK, but why pleading First degree murder to second degree manslaughter? Why not First degree manslaughter? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 7:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/8 "2015-11-28T07:27:20Z")
So prison is a place where you’ll be tortured, raped, and killed. And yet, innocent people are willing to agree to go to prison rather risk a trial. ---
**Author:** ![Claverhouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/13edae/32.png) [@Claverhouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claverhouse)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 7:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/9 "2015-11-28T07:44:33Z")
Yeah, but you’re only tortured, raped and killed for 5 years instead of 30. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 7:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/10 "2015-11-28T07:46:06Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > So prison is a place where you’ll be tortured, raped, and killed. > > And yet, innocent people are willing to agree to go to prison rather risk a trial. No, the point was that a sentence of decades makes prison a place where you’ll be tortured, raped, and killed. Innocent people will agree to go to prison for 5 years rather than rather risk a trial which is likely to result in a sentence of decades, which will result in them being tortured, raped, and killed. Whether you agree with the argument being made, you should at least represent it accurately. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/11 "2015-11-28T08:11:08Z")
Raises a potential “prisoner’s dilemma” thought experiment where _every_ defendant at a particular time refuses to bargain and indeed pursues whatever legal strategies they can to slow their cases down. Would the system crash? Would half or more of them get their cases kicked out of necessity? ---
**Author:** ![Habeed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a587f6/32.png) [@Habeed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Habeed)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 9:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/12 "2015-11-28T09:17:10Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > No, the point was that a sentence of decades makes prison a place where you’ll be tortured, raped, and killed. Innocent people will agree to go to prison for 5 years rather than rather risk a trial which is likely to result in a sentence of decades, which will result in them being tortured, raped, and killed. Every year of imprisonment is a chance you’ll get tortured/raped/killed. Obviously it isn’t guaranteed. But obviously it is hugely common - as I mentioned in my post, it doesn’t have to be a direct killing. The prison can just come up with bureaucratic excuses not to pay for Hep C meds and you die of liver failure. ---
**Author:** ![SantaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/da6949/32.png) [@SantaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SantaMan)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 9:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/13 "2015-11-28T09:47:01Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Raises a potential “prisoner’s dilemma” thought experiment where _every_ defendant at a particular time refuses to bargain and indeed pursues whatever legal strategies they can to slow their cases down. Would the system crash? Would half or more of them get their cases kicked out of necessity? Didn’t that happen during the civil rights era? Protesters refusing to post bail so that it clogged up the courts and jails? ---
**Author:** ![Claverhouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/13edae/32.png) [@Claverhouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claverhouse)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/14 "2015-11-28T10:41:00Z")
If only 10% of cases are tried, with no room for them all to be tried, that leads either to: 1/ America being a highly legalistic process-driven culture, there are too many laws; and in a representative political state, where congresspeople and state politicians are driven to prove themselves by ever introducing more laws ( they went into politics to make a difference ), more laws will accumulate into a tidal wave. or 2/ Late 18th and early 19th century Americans were as notoriously murderous and lawless as the London Mob from which many descended; in the 20th century they had tamed a lot and were as law-abiding ( apart from murder ) as anywhere: are they now suddenly massively criminal scofflaws to be charged so much ? I would go with too many laws. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/15 "2015-11-28T13:03:42Z")
> [@bomberswarm2](#): > > OK, but why pleading First degree murder to second degree manslaughter? Why not First degree manslaughter? You’ve explained to us that you’re not an American. The various flavors of murder and manslaughter differ in all 50 states. The attitudes of prosecutors differ across all 3150 counties. There are no specific answers to the legal hypotheticals you keep asking. And the generalities are equally true in the USA as they are in most Western nations. Probably including the one you live in. Plea bargains are not a US-only phenomenon. Although the rampant overcharging that’s common here probably makes them a bigger part of criminal justice practice than in other more civilized nations. ---
**Author:** ![bucketybuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@bucketybuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bucketybuck)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/16 "2015-11-28T13:18:20Z")
So on the face of it you have a system where: A) If you are actually innocent you are almost forced to take prison time anyway and B) If you are actually guilty you get away far lighter than you should do I know there are lots of factors involved but a system weighted in favour of the guilty doesn’t seem right. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/17 "2015-11-28T13:42:26Z")
> [@bucketybuck](#): > > I know there are lots of factors involved but a system weighted in favour of the guilty doesn’t seem right. It’s not a system weighted in favor of the guilty; it’s a system weighted in favor of the accused, and that’s how it should be. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/18 "2015-11-28T15:31:15Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > The various flavors of murder and manslaughter differ in all 50 states. The attitudes of prosecutors differ across all 3150 counties. > > There are no specific answers to the legal hypotheticals you keep asking. Given this, this is probably better suited to IMHO. Colibri General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/19 "2015-11-28T15:44:57Z")
> [@Claverhouse](#): > > I would go with too many laws. I doubt it. I’d say for all practical purposes every person in jail is in there for a crime anybody with a half a brain knows is a crime. ---
**Author:** ![Claverhouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/13edae/32.png) [@Claverhouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claverhouse)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2015, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800/20 "2015-11-28T16:32:04Z")
Not related. I was questioning why there are so many cases before the courts, 90% estimated not to go to trial in return for a plea. Some moralists would argue that they shouldn’t be given pleas but ought to serve sentences instead, being as guilty as those in jail. America’s over-incarceration problem would suddenly become even more massive. Personally I doubt prisoning is the ideal solution anyway. But people seem to like it. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-plea-deals-so-good/738800.md?page=2)