Sentence reductions for a guilty plea: The impact of the revised guideline on rates of pleas and ‘cracked trials’

In 2017, the Sentencing Council introduced a revised guideline for plea-based sentence reductions. The revisions were designed to provide greater certainty and to accelerate the timing of guilty pleas. Late pleas resulting in ‘cracked trials’ have long been a problem in the court system. The guideline was not intended to change the rate of defendants who plead guilty, but rather to increase the percentage of pleas entered early in the criminal process. This brief article reports findings from an analysis of data from the Crown Court before and after the introduction of the revised sentencing guideline. Findings reveal that the overall guilty plea remained stable over the period 2014–2019. The guideline appears to have had no effect on the timing of guilty pleas entered, and in fact the percentage of ‘cracked’ trials rose in the post-guideline period.

Part Two Rights, 7 The Rights of Victims and Transitional Justice

Because of the scope and duration of Colombia’s internal armed conflict, that conflict has produced much suffering in the civilian population. This chapter focuses on the Court’s jurisprudence protecting the rights of victims, especially of the internal armed conflict. In this area, the incorporation of international law has been particularly important. Drawing on this jurisprudence, the Court has insisted that victims be given rights to truth, justice, and reparations. The contours of this right have proven particularly important in processes in which the government has sought to give amnesties or sentence reductions in return for participation in the peace process by illegal armed groups, first with paramilitaries and now with guerrilla groups. In reviewing these frameworks, the Court has sought to create criteria that are flexible while retaining the core restrictions of international human rights law and international humanitarian law.

First Time Lucky? Exploring Whether First-Time Offenders Should Be Sentenced More Leniently

This article explores the normative position and theoretical justifications for sentencing first-time offenders more leniently than repeat offenders, and examines whether such a practice is defensible. Those justifications include a lack of awareness of the gravity of criminal behaviour, a single lapse, that no censure has previously been communicated by the criminal justice system to that person, adolescent-limited offending, the impact of being in a minority group, and non-uniform impact. It examines whether various sentencing philosophies support sentence reductions for first-time offenders, and whether the justifiability of such practices depends on the theoretical basis and aims of sentencing, for instance the role of proportionality and deterrence.