NCJ Number
230920
Date Published
2010
Length
9 pages
Annotation
In examining whether prosecutorial misconduct constitutes an ongoing practice of law violation by agents of the state, this chapter focuses on prosecutorial "overcharging," defined as "the practice of pleading unnecessary counts or overloading the charging documents to induce a guilty plea to lesser charges before trial" (Schons et al., 2001).
Abstract
In deciding whether prosecutorial overcharging qualifies as "state organized crime," the decision rests on the definition of "state organized crime." If it is defined as activity by government agents in violation of the laws of its sovereign, then overcharging, given the U.S Supreme Court's decision in "Bordenkircher," would not qualify as state organized crime; however, if "state organized crime" is defined as a pattern by government actors in violation of their ethical duties, then prosecutorial overcharging must be viewed as state organized crime. Both the American Bar Association and the California District Attorney Association have ethical guidelines that prohibit prosecutorial overcharging; therefore, it is legitimate to view violations of these standards as deviant acts, whether or not they are crimes. In terms of social harm, inducing defendants to plead guilty and forego their right to a jury trial creates harm for the defendants and their families. This chapter concludes that overloading the charging documents to induce a guilty plea before trial is a violation of the prosecutor's ethical and statutory duties and should be considered a form of state organized crime. This conclusion is based largely on a preliminary study of "overcharging" that involved an analysis of 200 cases drawn randomly from the 995 felony cases opened by the Santa Barbara County Public Defender in 2005 in Santa Barbara, CA. 13 notes and appended study data