Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in Law
When Public Defenders And Prosecutors Plea Bargain Race – A More Truthful Narrative, Elayne E. Greenberg
When Public Defenders And Prosecutors Plea Bargain Race – A More Truthful Narrative, Elayne E. Greenberg
Faculty Publications
(Excerpt)
This paper challenges prevailing stereotypes about public defenders and prosecutors and updates those stereotypes with a more accurate narrative about how reform-minded public defenders and prosecutors can plea bargain race to yield more equitable justice outcomes.
I was invited to the discussion about criminal justice reform in plea bargaining, because of my work in dispute resolution, dispute system design, and discrimination. Plea bargaining is a justice system negotiation that is used in upwards of 97% of criminal case dispositions. Unlike many of my colleagues in criminal justice reform who have also had years of experience working in the criminal …
Unshackling Plea Bargaining From Racial Bias, Elayne E. Greenberg
Unshackling Plea Bargaining From Racial Bias, Elayne E. Greenberg
Faculty Publications
“History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, [but] if faced with courage, need not be lived again.”
Dr. Maya Angelou
When an African American male defendant tries to plea bargain an equitable justice outcome, he finds that the deep-rooted racial bias that casts African American men as dangerous, criminal and animalistic, compromises his justice rights. Plea bargaining has become the preferred process used to secure convictions for upwards of 97 percent of cases because of its efficiency. This efficiency, however, comes at a cost. The structure and process of plea bargaining makes it more likely that the historical racial …