What is meant by the term "trial penalty/jury tax?"

Based on research, do you think defendants convicted after trial tend to be sentenced more severely than defendants who enter into a plea bargain with the prosecuting attorney? Please cite all relevant evidence in composing your answer.

 

Discretional justice

Trial penalty overview

The Jury tax defines the amount mainly paid by the court to the judicial offers in a judicial selection process (Johnson, 2019). This is a concept that the most common actors have widely accepted in the criminal justice system due to its key impacts. The notion behind this decision is that the defendants get a longer sentence during the trial process compared to the sentence they could have received through the plea bargaining process. Jury tax relies based on the daily services offered to the court. The court must therefore be disclosed in the annual taxable earnings for all tax-related purposes. The amount collected from the fines that the defendants and other suspects have to pay in a court preceding is useful in meeting all the needs of the criminal justice system.

Why the defendants convicted after trial tend to be sentenced more severely than defendants who enter into a plea bargain with the prosecuting attorney

In the court system, the prosecutor attorney may decide to take any approach to ensure that the right decision is attained based on the specific case in question (Almazrouei, Dror & Morgan, 2019). Plea bargaining is one of the approaches that the court may rely on when they want to reduce the complications of the sentencing process. Plea bargains were designed to benefit the court system and the defendants to avoid the whole process that takes relatively long. In addition, plea bargains were designed to offer a good approach that avoids the lengthy and costly trials that affect the guilty defendants on the charged cases. However, the intention of plea bargaining has notably changed because they have now become a way for low-income people to strategize how they can leave jail using any means necessary. Plea bargaining allows low-income people to plead guilty for the crimes they did not commit as a way to get out of jail.

In most cases, the defendants who are often convicted after the trial has begun are sentenced severely compared to the defendants who decide to take the plea bargaining offer after consultation with the prosecuting attorney. The above is mainly because plea bargaining often shortens the proceedings and makes the judicial process of deciding the case less complex. Pleading guilty cuts down the expenses of a lawyer and generally makes it easy for one to complete the entire process without the need to undergo the complex trial process (Schneider & Alkon, 2019). In exchange for pleading guilty and agreeing to cooperate with the criminal justice system, the defendant may receive a lighter sentence and at the same time have some of the charges reduced from their trial. Further, it is worth noting that pleading guilty is a better approach that avoids the uncertainty of a trial, thus assuring the defendants who enter plea bargaining with the prosecuting attorney a shorter and less severe sentence. For the defendants who opt to be tried after a trial, the court system has ample time to assess the current situation and decide their fate (Korankye-Sakyi, 2021). This assures them a prolonged and more complex sentence since the prosecuting attorney had ample time to review the case and make their judgment. For instance, plea bargaining on a murder related case reduces the sentence from a death sentence to a life sentence, thus ensuring that the complex sentencing for the specific crime is avoided.

Trial penalty discussion response

Response to Trevor

According to your post, one understands trial penalty as the smaller sentence offered to a defendant in the course of a plea bargain before the criminal trial rather than the larger sentence that could be offered if the defendant agreed to take up the trial (Wilford, Wells & Frazier, 2021). I agree with your post that the trial penalty is quite severe and prevalent, and it eliminates one's constitutional right to a trial. Once the defendants agree to attend a trial, their sentencing is harsher or similar to defendants that plead guilty (Redlich et al., 2017). You make a great statement about the criminal court system that once the defendants fail to attend a plea-bargaining process, they are punished more severely. I agree with your post that defendants who receive cruel sentencing in their trial are likely to be incarcerated after the conviction. I agree with your statement about the existence of the trial penalty and the jury tax (Johnson, 2019).