GateHouse Media
August 25, 2019
William R. Kelly, director of the Center for Criminology and
Criminal Justice Research at the University of Texas at Austin told The Crime
Report last fall, “There are situations - we don’t know how many - where
individuals find themselves in a particular situation where the government
claims they have certain evidence, and pleading to a crime they didn’t commit
may be people’s best option.”
It seems astonishing that people plead guilty to crimes they
didn’t commit. Here are some things to consider. In the United States of
America, a police officer can lie to an accused about incriminating evidence
during an interrogation and elicit a confession, and the U.S. Supreme Court has
said there is nothing wrong with such conduct.
Then there is the “trial penalty.” A widely lamented tool of
prosecutors used to punish people who go to trial with greater sentences than
similarly situated defendants who plea bargain. Plea negotiations are often
clouded by the threat that conviction at trial will result in a much lengthier
sentence than a plea. There are reams of data to support the existence of the
trial penalty.
Most defendants who pass through the criminal justice system
waive the right to a trial, and all the constitutional protections that come
with being charged, in exchange for a plea bargain. Emily Yoffe wrote in The
Atlantic that the vast majority of felony convictions are now the result of
plea bargains - about 94% at the state level and 97% at the federal level.
To further complicate matters, funding for indigent defense
has declined. According to the Pew Charitable Trusts, only 27% of county-based
and 21% of state-based public defender’s offices have enough lawyers to
appropriately handle their caseloads.
The backroom lies, threats and underfunding pale in
comparison to what nearly every state in the country permits in open court, and
the U.S. Supreme Court sanctions - an innocent person pleading guilty to a
crime.
The road to state-sanctioned imprisonment of potentially
innocent individuals began in 1963 with Henry C. Alford. Alford was indicted
for first-degree murder, a capital offense in North Carolina. Although he
proclaimed his innocence, he pleaded guilty to killing a man with a shotgun. He
said in court, “I’m not guilty, but I plead guilty.”
The U.S. Supreme Court confirmed his conviction in 1970 and
forever more Henry C. Alford’s name was attached to the controversial practice
of pleading guilty - an Alford plea - while claiming innocence.
The Supreme Court ruled in Alford’s case, “An individual
accused of crime may voluntarily, knowingly, and understandingly consent to the
imposition of a prison sentence even if he is unwilling or unable to admit his
participation in the acts constituting the crime.”
Forty-seven states and the District of Columbia allow for
Alford pleas, only New Jersey, Indiana and Michigan forbid the practice.
Alford pleas permit a defendant to concede that the
prosecution can prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt while maintaining
innocence. The prosecution then provides the factual basis for the guilty plea
by providing the court with detailed documentation that the accused is guilty.
The judge must decide whether there is sufficient evidence to support a
conviction.
An accused proclaiming innocence should have his day in
court. What does the system gain by permitting an innocent person to go to
prison through the means of a lenient negotiated plea as opposed to going to
trial?
Whether by Alford plea or conviction at trial the accused is
wrongly imprisoned. A conviction at trial of an innocent person is a mistake.
An Alford plea is tacit governmental approval of locking away a potentially
innocent person.
Matthew T. Mangino is of counsel with Luxenberg, Garbett, Kelly & George P.C. His book The Executioner’s Toll, 2010 was released by McFarland Publishing. You can reach him at www.mattmangino.com and follow him on Twitter @MatthewTMangino.
Matthew T. Mangino is of counsel with Luxenberg, Garbett, Kelly & George P.C. His book The Executioner’s Toll, 2010 was released by McFarland Publishing. You can reach him at www.mattmangino.com and follow him on Twitter @MatthewTMangino.
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