Pleading Straight Up, No Chaser! (Plea Agreements, Part I)

Pleading guilty and waiving your right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt at trial is the most important choice a client will make in any case. 

But the decision to enter into a less than ideal plea agreement with the government is often influenced by fear, intimidation and false information. 

So, it’s time to give greater consideration to a third option – pleading “straight up” with no written agreement with the government.  Why would one ever consider doing such a thing?  Listen and find out!

This is a two-part episode, as there is a lot of ground to cover.  Part One lays the foundation, and gives great stats.  Part Two gives clients the information they need to determine whether the plea the government is offering is worth the paper it is printed on. 

PART I:

• A little tequila talk;
• Current events:  the latest on the fight to disqualify the US attorney in New Jersey;
• Current events:  predictions on who will be the new AG;
• DOJ’s proposed rule to shut down state bar ethics investigation of DOJ lawyers;
• What does it mean to plead guilty “open” or “straight up”;
• The (sometimes) myth of the “trial penalty”;
• Statistics about pleas vs. trial

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