Detail The supreme court holds that rule 11(c)(1) errors do not require automatic vacatur of guilty pleas   Oleh:  Aquilio, Mark Jenis: Article from Proceeding Dalam koleksi: American Society of Business and Behavioral Sciences (ASBBS) Proceedings: Feb 2014; Vol. 21 (1), page 1-11. Fulltext: 01 - ASBBS 2014 - p12.pdf (496.38KB) Isi artikel In U.S. v. Davila, the Supreme Court ruled that a violation of Rule 11(c)(1) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, which instructs that “[t]he court must not participate in [plea] discussions,” does not require automatic vacatur of a defendant’s guilty plea. The Court held that Rule 11(h), which states, “A variance from the requirements of th[e] rule is harmless error if it does not affect substantial rights,” is controlling. Rule 52(a), which covers trial court errors in general, provides that “Any error . . . that does not affect substantial rights must be disregarded.” The Court held that “to affect substantial rights” requires a showing of prejudice regarding the defendant’s decision to plead guilty; thus the court must review the entire record and determine whether it was reasonably probable that but for the Rule 11(c)(1) violation, the defendant would have exercised his right to go to trial. The Court’s holding is equally applicable to Rule 52(b), which states, “A plain error that affects substantial rights may be considered even though it was not brought to the trial court’s attention.” The Court reasoned that nothing in the text of Rule 11(c)(1) requires automatic vacatur of the plea without regard to the specific circumstances of the case. Also, Rule 11(h) was enacted to stop automatic vacaturs and requires across-the-board application of the harmless error prescription or plain error rule. In addition, Rule 11(c)(1) was not adopted due to any constitutional requirement. Davila has application in all types of federal criminal proceedings. Opini Anda Klik untuk menuliskan opini Anda tentang koleksi ini! Kembali

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