Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> writes:
Bell was not coerced into taking the plea agreement; if anything, he seems to have more mental resources to fight the system than other defendants I have interviewed.
Unless the plea agreement specifies a sentence equal to the upper range that would likely be applied after a conviction was won, it is not difficult to infer that the plea agreement is being signed in order to lock-in a shorter sentence, with the accuracy of the government's account of the alleged misdeeds being a lesser consideration. Most plea bargaining, by its very nature, is coercion plain and simple. Just as the common practice of cutting deals in return for testimony the prosecution wants, or deferring sentencing until such testimony has been provided, results in coerced testimony. That the Justice System recognizes the payment of even one penny to a witness as tainting testimony, but looks the other way when years are knocked off sentences in order to secure testimony or agreement to government-authored laundry lists of antisocial acts, is evidence of the degree to which the government values expediency over fairness in processing caseloads. So I repeat my question. Does Jim Bell, aside from signing a statement prepared for him by the government, in order to avoid a much longer sentence, acknowlege annoying the IRS with unpleasant-smelling chemical substances? A "yes" or "no" will suffice. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law"