If a person is given the chance of pleading guilty or innocent. Why would someone choose to plead innocent if pleading guilty gives a lesser punishment.
What happens if they plead innocent? Does the case remain open?
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If you plead Guilty, you forfeit the court case, and you get judged Guilty, and you move into sentencing. But plea deals are sometimes offered by the system, so you get that plea deal which can be less than if you go to trial. The DA/system offers this deal because they want the easy conviction, and they’ll incentivize you to take it and serve your punishment and they clear that case from the books.
If you decline their deal, and plead innocent, you then go to trial. That deal is now off the table, you cannot get it, because the DA actually has to do the trial and waste resources prosecuting you. So they’ll now conduct the full trial and if they win and find you guilty, they’ll sentence you more fully, no discounts.
It’s a bit of a gamble for you. So you talk to your lawyer, the pro. Hopefully you have a good lawyer. If you don’t think you can win the case based on the evidence, it’s better to take the deal than to draw out a trial only to lose worse and have more punishment. If you think you can win, obviously you want to go to trial and try to win, but you gamble that you may still lose.
Taking a plea deal for Guilty means you 100% lose, but you lock in a discounted punishment. It makes sense in some cases, and is a terrible plan in others. Listen to your lawyer(s) and find the path that makes sense for your situation.
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