This new judicial opinion gives prosecutors even more leverage over defendants, allowing them to be the sole arbiters of what is fair and just.
, though, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit significantly limited the ability of judges to reject plea bargains, broadening the power of prosecutors beyond its already expansive reach. The case arose out of a prosecution of a defendant in Detroit who had been charged with drug and gun crimes that carried a combined mandatory minimum sentence of 20 years in prison. The U.S.
In an opinion on the matter, the judge expressed concern that the waivers would prevent any judicial oversight of prosecutorial misconduct in the plea bargaining process, and that it would prevent the court of appeals from correcting any errors that the judge himself might make in sentencing the defendant. The judge also expressed concern that these types of waivers interfere with the development of criminal law more generally as part of the normal appellate process.
The second reason the 6th Circuit gave for overruling the trial judge is even worse. The appellate court said that a judge may only reject a plea bargain for case-specific reasons. In other words, the judge must be able to point to some specific fact that made the plea agreement unacceptable in this particular case; it cannot rely on reasons that apply more generally to a large number of cases.
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