photo credit: mimentza

One of the things about our judicial system that has always bothered me is the time and expense (tax dollars) that are wasted in criminal trials when the suspect is obviously guilty. Don’t get me wrong - I definitely agree that suspects are not guilty until proven otherwise. We are all entitled to a fair trial with legal representation. I’m not talking about throwing out our Constitutional rights.

What I am referring to are cases where a suspect is caught “red handed” and the suspect pleads not guilty in order to postpone and drag out the trial with the hope that they will somehow get off on a technicality. For example, there is a local case where a woman is being accused of identity theft. She is suspected of obtaining credit card information from her employer, a business that does sales over the internet. Police found over 100 items in her home that were fraudulently purchased with stolen credit card information. Credit card information for at least 46 people, all from out of state, were also found. She has been charged with 37 felonies. Of course, she has plead not guilty and is out on $10,000 bail.

It just doesn’t seem right that tax payers are now going to foot the bill for her trial, most likely including a defense attorney, even though it seems pretty obvious that she is guilty. Multiply these types of cases a million times (billions?) and we are talking about a huge amount of tax dollars being wasted every single year. Additionally, our court systems are extremely overloaded and these types of case only contribute to that problem.

Here is what I propose. When a suspect is initially brought before a judge, they would be given two options. They can plead guilty and accept their punishment. Or, they can plead not-guilty and take the chance that their sentence will be doubled if convicted. For example, if a person arraigned on first degree murder pleads guilty, they get a life sentence. If they plead not guilty and are convicted, they get the death penalty.

Of course, there is the issue of whether someone pleads guilty just to avoid the more severe punishment, even though they are in fact innocent. I don’t have a clear answer to that question except that this type of arrangement would have to be offered in cases where the evidence overwhelmingly supports a guilty verdict. Maybe the defense attorney could help the suspect make the decision.

In any case, I think there is something wrong with a legal system that allows criminals to blatantly waste tax dollars, cause additional grief among family members of a victim, or forcing a victim to testify in open court when it really isn’t necessary.

This is just my opinion. What’s yours?