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The Role of Courtroom Workgroups in Felony Case Dispositions: An Analysis of Workgroup Familiarity and Similarity
Author(s) -
Metcalfe Christi
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
law and society review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.867
H-Index - 74
eISSN - 1540-5893
pISSN - 0023-9216
DOI - 10.1111/lasr.12217
Subject(s) - plea , workgroup , disposition , similarity (geometry) , odds , psychology , pleading , criminology , law , social psychology , political science , computer science , computer network , logistic regression , artificial intelligence , machine learning , image (mathematics)
While pleading guilty has become ubiquitous in criminal trial courts, limited research has focused on the plea process and the factors that influence guilty plea convictions. Numerous theoretical accounts of the plea process highlight the importance of the court actors and their interactions. Based on this research, the current study analyzes the impact of courtroom actor familiarity and similarity on the chosen mode of disposition and the time to disposition. The findings demonstrate that similarity among the actors and familiarity between the prosecutor and judge increase the odds of a plea disposition and reduce the days to disposition. However, familiarity of the defense attorney seems to impede on the informal plea process, such that cases are more likely to proceed to trial when the defense attorney is more familiar with the other actors.