Week 4: Return of the king

Welcome back everyone to my Senior Project Blog! This week I was able to return back to my on-site location and collect some much needed data. During my week away I planned on what I was going to do upon return. I realized that sectioning my paper into multiple parts would be the most ideal way of relaying data and coming to researched conclusions on plea deals. The first part of my paper will be purely procedural; similarly to Mrs. Giordanno’s thesis, this section will discuss how plea deals work and what the overall system allows. Not only that but I will give a brief overview of the biases present and what the preliminary thoughts from scholars are on the subject.

The next section of my paper will be dedicated to what I spent my research doing this week. I will be creating a chart of 10 example cases that I read over in the office. I will not be using names but rather simple initials so they cannot be tracked. I will not mention specifics or conversations that are protected by attorney client privilege. What I will be listing is the initial charges against the defendant and the outcome of these charges. I will create a chart compiling all of these data pieces and then count up how many resulted in plea bargains or just simply did not go to trial at all. The numbers hypothetically should back up the general research done by research centers coming out to around 99% of all cases. That should leave me with 9/10 cases finalizing without a trial.

The third section of my paper will discuss the results of the questionnaire which I discussed in my previous blog post.

The fourth section will be a direct analysis of example cases which I will be working on real time to discuss the reasons defendants, attorneys, and prosecutors choose a plea. I will not discuss confidential information but will provide a few details in order to relay my point to the audience.

Lastly, I will write a final conclusion section by putting each of the previous sections in conversation and highlighting what the outcomes could mean for the general plea bargaining institution. Not only that but I will provide my proposal for an improved and more equitable choice for the system as a whole. I look forward to continuing my research and keeping you all updated throughout the process. Come back next week for more fun research!