In Why Innocent People Confess , Michael Kinsley explores a connection between plea bargaining and false confessions.

"The emphasis on capital crimes is misleading in a couple of ways, though. Crimes such as murder and rape are amenable to reversal by DNA testing, but there is no reason to assume that wrongful convictions are more common in DNA-friendly crimes than in others. In fact, there is good reason to assume the opposite."

"Murder and rape convictions, especially those with a prospect of capital punishment, generally follow a full-dress trial with all its elaborate rights and protections for the defendant. A false confession under these circumstances is highly unusual and highly suggestive that something improper went on at the police station."

Kinsley says that "for every one criminal conviction that comes after a trial, 19 other cases are settled by plea bargain.... If you're the suspect, sometimes this means agreeing with the prosecutor that you will confess to jaywalking when you're really guilty of armed robbery. Sometimes, though, it means confessing to armed robbery when you're not guilty of anything at all."

Kinsley explains the history of plea bargaining:

"As our official system of justice became larded with more and more protections for the accused, actually going through the process of catching, prosecuting and convicting a criminal the official way became impossibly burdensome. So the government offered the accused a deal: You get a lighter sentence if you save us the trouble of a trial. Or, to put it in a more sinister way: You get a heavier sentence if you insist on asserting your constitutional rights to a trial, to confront your accusers, to privacy from searches without probable cause, to avoid incriminating yourself, etc."

Kinsley compares plea bargaining to an insurance policy: "Plea bargaining is a way of trading the risk of 20 years to life for the certainty of five to seven. But by creating this choice, and ratcheting up the odds to make it nearly irresistible, American justice virtually guarantees that innocent people are being punished."

Kinsley concludes with a look at the Central Park Jogger case and says that unofficial offers of lighter sentences convinced the five youths to confess to the rape which they didn't commit. The catch-22 was that when they went before the board, they got extra time for not confessing to the crime which they didn't commit.

"Constitutional protections like the right against self-incrimination don't apply to hearings, either. You don't have to confess, but extra years of prison are the price if you don't."

Update: The bottom line on plea bargains:

"Everybody knows that the dice are loaded
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed"

From Leonard Cohen's "Everybody Knows" , also recorded by Don Henley on his Actual Miles album.