<story><title>Rikers Drove My Innocent Patient to Plead Guilty</title><url>http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/10/rikers-island-plea-bargains-213223</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>Asbostos</author><text>How is a plea deal not duress? Imagine if a cop pointed a gun at you and said &amp;quot;I&amp;#x27;ll shoot you unless you confess&amp;quot;. We wouldn&amp;#x27;t accept that confession but we do accept a prosecutor saying &amp;quot;you&amp;#x27;ll get the death penalty at trial unless you plead guilty now.&amp;quot; Same goes for lesser sentences vs threats of physical violence.</text></comment>
<story><title>Rikers Drove My Innocent Patient to Plead Guilty</title><url>http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/10/rikers-island-plea-bargains-213223</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>blisterpeanuts</author><text>Plea bargaining should not exist. It makes a mockery of justice, turns the legal system into a marketplace where you bid for relative degrees of guilt and are rewarded for &amp;quot;copping a plea&amp;quot;, and occasionally snares the innocent.&lt;p&gt;The war on drugs has clogged the system, but also our somewhat lawless and rudderless population since the early 1960s, when a generally orderly society gave way to a general contempt for authority.  And the population has grown far faster than the number of courts to accommodate it.&lt;p&gt;I think the only solution is to legalize drugs and build more courts to address the remaining cases more quickly and efficiently, without throwing due process out the window.&lt;p&gt;Better education would help, too. And instill moral education in our children in the schools and at home. In the end, a more moral society will bring about a more moral justice system.</text></comment>