Prosecutors and Plea Bargaining

This article reviews the empirical research literature on plea bargaining in the United States. It starts with an historical overview of the evolution of plea bargaining in the criminal justice system. It describes how the rise in plea bargaining has been coupled with an expansion of prosecutorial power. In particular, it elaborates on the role of modern sentencing reforms in enhancing prosecutorial discretion in plea negotiations. Next, it examines normative perspectives and philosophical arguments regarding the utility of plea bargaining. This includes discussion of how plea bargaining may circumvent the goals of criminal punishment. Lastly, it reviews the empirical state of the research literature on plea bargaining and offers future directions for expanding this work. It concludes with policy recommendations aimed at addressing continuing issues and concerns in the guilty plea process.

Inter-gender murder in NSW, 1901–1955: Reconsidering the laws of the fraternity

Contemporary studies that focus on intimate homicide assume that patterns of policing, prosecution and punishment were uniformly disadvantageous to women before feminist activists intervened in the 1970s. This article tests that assumption by drawing on the Prosecution Project’s digitisation of Australian criminal trial records. Using this resource, we selected all prosecutions ( n = 314) of men for murders of women and of women for murders of men in New South Wales, from Federation (1901) to 1955, the year the state abolished the death penalty. By coding victim–offender relationships and analysing them in relation to case outcomes, we found that men were far more likely than women to be convicted of murder, including seven men executed for intimate femicides. By contrast, women were more likely than men to be acquitted outright, rather than plead guilty to manslaughter of male intimates, a trend that feminist research has identified recently. This research provides new findings of use to critical appraisals of the charging and sentencing reforms that were meant to remedy ‘the laws of the fraternity’.

Custodialism Reborn

By the end of the 1960s, anti-institutionalism had extended beyond mental health and bled into prison reform. This chapter tracks the rise and fall of efforts to find alternatives to prisons. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, changes in psychiatry, politics, and the law led to a deinstitutionalization in both mental health and corrections policy making. Not only did politicians and advocates look for alternatives to mental hospitals, they also sought alternatives to prisons. They expanded probation, parole, and furlough and created community corrections initiatives such as halfway houses and work-release programs. The number of people in prisons and jails fell, even during a time of increased policing. These reforms came under attack, however, as politicians depicted people in prison as dangerous criminals and ushered in harsh sentencing reforms. A law and order politics that relied on racial discrimination halted efforts to deinstitutionalize prisons. By the mid-1970s, after more than a decade of decline, new prison construction began and the number of imprisoned people nationwide rose. These changes had a devastating effect on individuals with mental health conditions. Many of them were caught in the web of this new era of mass incarceration.

RACIAL DIFFERENCES IN THE EFFECT OF MARRIAGEABLE MALES ON FEMALE FAMILY HEADSHIP

Female family headship has strong implications for endemic poverty in the United States. Consequently, it is imperative to explore the chief factors that contribute to this problem. Departing from prior literature that places significant weight on welfare-incentive effects, our study highlights the role of male marriageability in explaining the prevalence of never-married female family headship for blacks and whites. Specifically, we examine racial differences in the effect of male marriageability on never-married female headship from 1980 to 2010. By exploiting data from IPUMS-USA (N = 4,958,722) and exogenous variation from state-level sentencing reforms, the study finds that the decline in the relative supply of marriageable males significantly increases the incidence of never-married female family headship for blacks but not for whites.

Statutory Sentencing Reform in Israel: Exploring the Sentencing Law of 2012

In 2012 the Knesset approved a new sentencing law. Israel thus became the latest jurisdiction to introduce statutory directions for courts to follow in sentencing. The approach of the United States to structuring judicial discretion often entails the use of a sentencing grid with presumptive sentencing ranges. In contrast, the Sentencing Act of Israel reflects a less prescriptive method: it provides guidance by words rather than numbers. Retributivism is clearly identified as the penal philosophy underpinning the new law, which takes a novel approach to promoting more proportionate sentencing. Courts are directed to construct an individualised proportionate sentencing range appropriate to the case in hand. Once this is established, the court then follows additional directions regarding factors and principles related to sentencing. Although other jurisdictions have placed the purposes and principles of sentencing on a statutory footing, this is the first such legislative declaration in Israel. The statute also contains a methodology to implement a proportional approach to sentencing as well as detailed guidance on sentencing factors. This article describes and explores the new Sentencing Act, making limited comparisons to sentencing reforms in other jurisdictions – principally England and Wales, New Zealand and the United States. In concluding, we speculate on the likely consequences of the law: will it achieve the goals of promoting more consistent and principled sentencing?