From The New York State Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers:
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Over the past three decades, the number of criminal trials in New York State has steadily declined, and guilty pleas have become the principal mechanism of convictions. The decline in trials and rise in guilty pleas severely weakens the integrity of the justice system. Trials and pretrial motion practice provide a critical check on law enforcement overreach and abuse and assures public transparency in the administration of justice. Guilty pleas not only allow prosecutors to avoid proving their case before a jury of the defendant’s peers, but also to avoid legal and constitutional challenges to law enforcement methods of investigation. Defendants who plead guilty generally are required to waive appellate review, foreclosing another avenue of legal challenge to their convictions and sentences.
This report from the Trial Penalty Task Force of the New York State Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NYSACDL) explores a key reason for the decline in trials: the trial penalty. Criminal defendants face a trial penalty when they receive a sentence after trial that is substantially greater than the plea offer they received before trial. Faced with the prospect of a longer, and perhaps substantially longer sentence, defendants are understandably reluctant to take their case to trial. Furthermore, plea offers often are made in a manner that discourages pretrial motion practice, and even encourages defendants to waive their right to be indicted by a grand jury and to receive discovery.
To understand this troubling phenomenon, NYSACDL developed and launched a survey of New York State criminal justice practitioners. More than three hundred criminal defense attorneys from across New York State responded, sharing their personal experiences and observations of the impact of the trial penalty and stories of clients who experienced it firsthand. NYSACDL conducted a statistical analysis of criminal convictions in New York State assembling a sample of 79 cases from Manhattan criminal defense organizations with plea and conviction information to investigate whether there was a trial penalty in New York State and the impact of any such penalty
Key Findings
New York State has a trial penalty: 94% of practitioners agreed that the trial penalty plays a role in criminal practice in their county.
The trial penalty manifests in numerous ways: While longer sentences are part of the trial penalty, they are not the only part. To obtain favorable pleas, defendants are also forced to waive various appellate rights and the ability to challenge the government’s case through motion practice.
Numerous factors drive the trial penalty: The trial penalty is driven by a broad range of different factors. Prosecutorial practices such as aggressive charging, judicial pressure to plead guilty, and the prospect of severe criminal penalties, sentencing enhancements and mandatory minimums should a defendant proceed to trial are significant contributors. Defense counsels’ excessive caseloads also contribute to the pressure on defendants take pleas and forgo exercising their statutory and constitutional rights.
Data confirms the existence of a trial penalty: Data analysis supported practitioners’ insights. In 66% of cases, defendants in the sample experienced a trial penalty. The data also shows increased plea offers are associated with increased eventual sentences. For example, a plea offer of five years was associated, after conviction at trial, with a sentence of 7.5 years and a 20 year offer would be associated with a 28 year sentence.
Read the full report here.
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