Sometimes, saying 'no' to a plea deal is the best move. People who go to trial and lose often get less prison time than the 'deal' they were offered.
March 27, 2026
Original Paper
A (Plea) Offer You Can Refuse
SSRN · 6473938
The Takeaway
The common 'trial penalty' theory suggests that defendants are punished with longer sentences for refusing to plead guilty. This data reveals that initial plea offers are often so aggressive that they exceed the sentences eventually handed down by judges, even for those convicted at trial.
From the abstract
<div> Plea bargaining is ubiquitous in the U.S., yet lack of data on rejected plea offers constrains empirical analysis. We compile novel data covering all initial plea offers for 23,000 felony cases in Philadelphia from 2012–2017. Our analysis yields three main insights. First, rejected offers are longer than eventual sentences, even for defendants convicted at trial. This contradicts the conventional “trial penalty” theory, namely that rejecting a plea offer leads to longer sentences for using