Abstract
The many contributing factors and potential solutions to plea bargaining’s innocence issue are too numerous to examine here. Plea bargaining, however, as illustrated above, is an important piece of the modern innocence debate and was the subject that prompted the 2015 innocence discussion. In the essays that follow, several others who participated in the roundtable share their perspectives on various nuances and facets of the issue of innocence.
Professor Richard Leo begins the collection with an analysis of the shifting meaning of “innocence” in American scholarship over the last few decades. His analysis of the concepts of “factual innocence” and “exoneration” sets the stage for the innocence issues discussed in the remaining pieces. As Professor Leo states in his essay, “How we define innocence and classify wrongful convictions matters, both empirically and normatively.”
Professor Meghan Ryan’s essay delves into the issue of the reliability of evidence and tactics during criminal proceedings and discusses the relationship between these concerns and wrongful convictions. Professor Ryan argues that those involved in the criminal justice system must “recognize and embrace their own fallibility.” Through such a recognition, she argues, a more critical examination of the system might occur.
Professor Valena Beety examines the issue of scientific evidence and argues that wrongful convictions reveal significant issues regarding a “disconnect between forensic experts and officers of the court on scientific understanding and scientific ignorance.” In particular, Professor Beety discusses several examples of unreliable scientific evidence being admitted against defendants with little challenge from the bench or bar because of a “gap in knowledge.”
Professor Gregory Gilchrist returns the discussion to plea bargaining and discusses the role of prosecutors and prosecutorial discretion in plea bargaining’s innocence issue. In an attempt to add greater transparency and accountability to the plea-bargaining machine, Professor Gilchrist proposes creating a public-review platform for the prosecutorial function. He writes, “If nothing else, exposure sustains public deliberation that itself might lead to better practices over time.”
Finally, Professor William Berry examines how we might better learn from wrongful convictions and how we might better move forward after injustice is discovered. Professor Berry offers a restorative model of punishment as a means of addressing both goals while still “hold[ing] individuals who contribute to wrongful convictions accountable.” Such a model, argues Professor Berry, will create a mechanism for the wrongfully convicted to express themselves, for those involved in the conviction to offer an apology, and for the system as a whole to learn from the mistakes that have led to innocence issues.
Through these diverse and innovative essays, the reader is able to glimpse the larger innocence discussion that occurred at the roundtable event in 2015. The ideas expressed in these pages begin a journey into an issue with many faces and many paths forward for discussion, research, and reform.
Recommended Citation
Lucian E. Dervan, Richard A. Leo, Meghan J. Ryan, Valena E. Beety, Gregory M. Gilchrist, and William W. Berry III,
Voices on Innocence,
68 Fla. L. Rev.
1569
(2016).
Available at: https://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/flr/vol68/iss6/12