Chapter 8 “Courts” focuses on the aspects of how courts function and the parts of each person involved including the judge, jury, prosecutor, and defense. A very important and common part of court cases are Plea Bargains, which can be helpful but also very harmful. Some good examples of how awful plea bargains can be include the “Central Park Five” (1989) case as well as the Case of “Brandon Bernard” (1999).
The court system is an in-depth process that involves many moving gears and different people from a variety of backgrounds to allow it to function. The Judge is a key player in this system because they dictate everything that goes on in the courtroom including the verdict. The jury is a group of citizens who listen in on a trail to help the judge determine said verdict. The prosecutor is the person who tries to gather evidence against the defendant in order to bring justice, while the defendant is the person trying to mitigate or ultimately acquit their client’s punishment (Fichtelberg, 2021). These are all important figures in every case, which leads into the main topic of this paper, Plea Bargains.
Plea bargains are deals that a prosecutor will offer the defendant in order to lessen their clients punishment as long as they agree to admit they are guilty. The main problem with this is that it doesn’t give a person the right to a trial, which by definition, is a violation of their human rights. Plea bargains can be used in selfish ways such as it benefiting the workgroup along with prosecutors workload. If there is a plea bargain, there is no trial, which means way less work for the members of the court to do. On the contrary, plea bargains can be seen as a good thing because let’s say someone committed a crime and there is a 100% chance they will face prison time, for them, it would be a better deal to submit to a plea bargain and lower their sentence rather than face a trial and ultimately fail. Even though this happens, it is more commonly seen used in a wrongful way, an example would be the Central Park Five case.
Five black and Latino boys were coerced into confessing the murder of a female jogger in central park, they accepted a plea bargain after unending pressure by police. They were convicted in 1990 and after spending 12 years in prison, they were found not guilty due to finding the real perpetrator (Sussman, 2002). This goes to show that the plea bargain can put innocent people in prison just because they were basically forced to accept it. They were offered no trial or any basic rights to defend themselves.
Another case dealing with the wrongful use of the plea bargain is Brandon Bernard (1999). Brandon was an 18 year old living in texas when he was convicted of murdering two youth ministers (Eversley, 2020). He was offered a plea deal and he accepted, to my understanding he did this because he was scared and wasn’t given the correct resources. He was sentenced to the death penalty even though people around the world said he was not even given a chance to go to trial or defend himself, which is illegal when this high risk is at stake (his life) (Fichtelberg, 2021). He was eventually victim to the death penalty in 2020, sparking worldwide criticism.
The plea bargain, to many, is a horrible act of injustice because it is a human right to trial. These cases are horrible but there are so many more like them around the world. In those few cases where the plea bargain is acceptable, it has shown unnecessary mercy to people who should have gone through their entire punishment. Overall, I understand why it is needed, but its misuse causes great pain in suffering for those that iot affects.
Work Cited
Central Park Five Case: Sussman, P. (2002). A nightmare of injustice: The story of the Central Park Five. New York Amsterdam News, 93(11), 12-15.
Brandon Bernard Case: Eversley, M. (2020). Brandon Bernard’s case: Federal execution of a young Black man raises questions about racial disparities in death row. USA Today. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/12/11/brandon-bernard-executed-death-penalty-case-raises-race-questions/3870207001/
Fichtelberg, A. (2021). Criminal (In)Justice. SAGE Publications.
The court system is an in-depth process that involves many moving gears and different people from a variety of backgrounds to allow it to function. The Judge is a key player in this system because they dictate everything that goes on in the courtroom including the verdict. The jury is a group of citizens who listen in on a trail to help the judge determine said verdict. The prosecutor is the person who tries to gather evidence against the defendant in order to bring justice, while the defendant is the person trying to mitigate or ultimately acquit their client’s punishment (Fichtelberg, 2021). These are all important figures in every case, which leads into the main topic of this paper, Plea Bargains.
Plea bargains are deals that a prosecutor will offer the defendant in order to lessen their clients punishment as long as they agree to admit they are guilty. The main problem with this is that it doesn’t give a person the right to a trial, which by definition, is a violation of their human rights. Plea bargains can be used in selfish ways such as it benefiting the workgroup along with prosecutors workload. If there is a plea bargain, there is no trial, which means way less work for the members of the court to do. On the contrary, plea bargains can be seen as a good thing because let’s say someone committed a crime and there is a 100% chance they will face prison time, for them, it would be a better deal to submit to a plea bargain and lower their sentence rather than face a trial and ultimately fail. Even though this happens, it is more commonly seen used in a wrongful way, an example would be the Central Park Five case.
Five black and Latino boys were coerced into confessing the murder of a female jogger in central park, they accepted a plea bargain after unending pressure by police. They were convicted in 1990 and after spending 12 years in prison, they were found not guilty due to finding the real perpetrator (Sussman, 2002). This goes to show that the plea bargain can put innocent people in prison just because they were basically forced to accept it. They were offered no trial or any basic rights to defend themselves.
Another case dealing with the wrongful use of the plea bargain is Brandon Bernard (1999). Brandon was an 18 year old living in texas when he was convicted of murdering two youth ministers (Eversley, 2020). He was offered a plea deal and he accepted, to my understanding he did this because he was scared and wasn’t given the correct resources. He was sentenced to the death penalty even though people around the world said he was not even given a chance to go to trial or defend himself, which is illegal when this high risk is at stake (his life) (Fichtelberg, 2021). He was eventually victim to the death penalty in 2020, sparking worldwide criticism.
The plea bargain, to many, is a horrible act of injustice because it is a human right to trial. These cases are horrible but there are so many more like them around the world. In those few cases where the plea bargain is acceptable, it has shown unnecessary mercy to people who should have gone through their entire punishment. Overall, I understand why it is needed, but its misuse causes great pain in suffering for those that iot affects.
Work Cited
Central Park Five Case: Sussman, P. (2002). A nightmare of injustice: The story of the Central Park Five. New York Amsterdam News, 93(11), 12-15.
Brandon Bernard Case: Eversley, M. (2020). Brandon Bernard’s case: Federal execution of a young Black man raises questions about racial disparities in death row. USA Today. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/12/11/brandon-bernard-executed-death-penalty-case-raises-race-questions/3870207001/
Fichtelberg, A. (2021). Criminal (In)Justice. SAGE Publications.
