Thanks for that link. I don’t understand why the plea bargain rate is at all relevant. Prosecutors try to dispose of most cases through plea bargaining, and paying a fine may be cheaper than paying legal costs for many people who plead guilty. I don’t see any reason why an innocent person would be any less likely to plead guilty.
The innocence project focuses on high-profile murder and rape cases where DNA evidence can be obtained, so it’s very non-representative of the criminal justice system as a whole.
Also, this ignores the question of legal justifications and excuses, and other defenses like illegally obtained evidence. If, as a matter of fact, you killed someone, but the evidence was obtained illegally, and you’re still found guilty of murder, that’s still a wrongful conviction.
″....even if juries get it right only 80 percent of the time (an assumption at which most sensible scholars would cringe).… But the real wrongful conviction rate is almost certainly lower, and significantly so … ”.
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=14481
Thanks for that link. I don’t understand why the plea bargain rate is at all relevant. Prosecutors try to dispose of most cases through plea bargaining, and paying a fine may be cheaper than paying legal costs for many people who plead guilty. I don’t see any reason why an innocent person would be any less likely to plead guilty.
The innocence project focuses on high-profile murder and rape cases where DNA evidence can be obtained, so it’s very non-representative of the criminal justice system as a whole.
Also, this ignores the question of legal justifications and excuses, and other defenses like illegally obtained evidence. If, as a matter of fact, you killed someone, but the evidence was obtained illegally, and you’re still found guilty of murder, that’s still a wrongful conviction.
The part relevant to my earlier post was:
″....even if juries get it right only 80 percent of the time (an assumption at which most sensible scholars would cringe).… But the real wrongful conviction rate is almost certainly lower, and significantly so … ”.