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Standards For Accepting Guilty Pleas To Misdemeanor Charges, Richard A. Kopek
Standards For Accepting Guilty Pleas To Misdemeanor Charges, Richard A. Kopek
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
The guilty plea-not the trial-is the most common manner of disposing of criminal cases in America. It has been estimated that 90 percent of all convictions and 95 percent of misdemeanor convictions are the result of guilty pleas. Various reasons have been advanced to explain this heavy reliance on the guilty plea. For example, it avoids the drain on judicial resources that would occur if all cases had to be tried. In addition, it eliminates the risks and uncertainties of trials and permits flexibility in sentencing. Because of the prevalence of guilty pleas, there must be procedural safeguards to insure …