[MRM]

Wow. That is the second most ignorant post I have ever read. The first is the similarly incoherent ranting over on Tab's "Fatone" post.

The DOJ keeps data on guilty pleas, but I don't know where to find it. I'm sure it's on the web somewhere. The percentages vary by state, but I'm sure the percentages are well over 90%, depending on how you classify crimes, charges and dispositions. To make sense of them you would have to know what the charge was for in the first place.

In my experience most petty offenses, like traffic tickets, go to trial or are dismissed. They require only a trial to a judge, so the state can cycle as many of them in a day as is needed. That's why traffic court is such a nightmare. Misdemeanors like simple assault, shoplifting, criminal damage to property, and drunk driving are almost all either plead guilty to or dismissed. Drug crimes are almost all plead guilty to or dismissed because there will be a preliminary hearing that is sort of a mini trial that determines the admissibility of the drugs. Once the admissibility of the drugs is determined there is nothing to fight over, either you had the drugs or you didn't. The more serious crimes like rape and murder almost always go to trial, at least where I practice. So I suppose there's kind of a reverse bell curve of plea bargaining.

One last thought, just because someone pleads guilty doesn't mean there has been a plea bargain. It is a constitutional right to plead guilty. Lots of times people just don't want to fight the inevitable so they do something called "straight plead" where they enter a guilty plea without any promise from the judge or prosecutor. That's called throwing yourself on the mercy of the court. Sometimes it's rewarded, sometimes not. But with sentencing guidelines, there's often nothing to negotiate, a guilty verdict is the same as a guilty plea.