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Right, which is why under the plea deal some charges were to be dropped, and some enhancements not argued at sentencing. The guilty plea would yield a different conviction than would a jury verdict.
You seem to be operating under the assumption that the plea deal reflects the "true" level of guilt, and that hence any punishment greater than the offer is unjust. But you have no basis for that assumption.
No I am not operating under that assumption. We have a constitution. It says you have a right to a jury trial. For other rights the government doesn’t get to coerce or charge you for them. There is no pay $100 for the right to free speech.
If these guys committed a very bad crime then they should be punished for those crimes. I’m not sure the government has a constitutional right to decide to negotiate on charges.
This is ability becomes much more of an issue with overcharging and all sorts of enhancements. These things have given the government the ability to use them as leverage to prevent jury trials. You just need to create statutes with big penalties to scare people into accepting whatever deal you offer. Which then takes away your ability to get a jury trial.
And yes of course jury trials aren’t practical. The founders didn’t imagine 4 month trials for a lot of the things. They likely saw smaller communities with simpler cases and a handful of witnesses.
But make no mistake the way our system works now has largely eliminated the right to a jury trial.
Again, if you are framing the longer sentence as a "charge" for having a jury trial, then you are assuming that the sentence in the plea deal was the "correct" sentence.
I am not making that assumption. I never said the plea deal was the right sentence. Perhaps the plea deal should have offered the years of the guilty verdict. But as a right the government can negotiate around what they think is the right deal.
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