Plea bargains a painful but necessary tool for the criminal justice system - San Jose Mercury News

Plea bargains a painful but necessary tool for the criminal justice system - San Jose Mercury News

"The two men charged with gunning down 3-year-old Carlos Fernando Nava in a failed attempt to kill two rivals were free to walk the streets despite violent pasts.

Both had been in the grip of law enforcement for previous crimes but, through plea bargains, were able to escape prolonged prison terms.

Lawrence Denard is the accused gunman, and Willie Torrence is suspected of driving a car used in the shooting.

The handling of their court cases highlights a necessary, but some say troubling, aspect of the criminal justice system, which is forced to process thousands of criminal cases a year with dwindling resources.

"The realities are the system cannot operate without plea bargaining -- we cannot handle the volume," said Laurie Levenson, a criminal law professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. "The system is overloaded, and the only way we keep things going is to plea bargain."

More than 90 percent of all criminal cases charged in California are settled through plea bargains, Levenson said. There are just not enough courtrooms, judges, lawyers or money available to bring every defendant charged with a case before a jury.

As a result, district attorneys are forced daily to balance the risks and rewards of reaching a deal with a defendant accused of a crime.

That decision, many said, is based in large part on the evidence collected in a case and the history of the defendant.

For Denard and Torrence, court records show, both the evidence collected against them in previous crimes and their history at the time of their past crimes allowed each to escape long prison terms despite what appear to be violent criminal histories.

"Every time you make a deal, you have to worry, 'Is this the bad apple that is going to cause trouble down the road?' " Levenson said. "It is the risk inherent in plea bargaining, and you hope you make the right decision."

Denard's criminal history dates back to January 2004, when he was accused of being part of a group of young men who mugged a street vendor in the 1100 block of 76th Avenue in Oakland.

Initially charged with robbery, Denard eventually took a plea deal in March 2004 that resulted in him pleading no contest to grand theft and getting five years of felony probation.

Six months later, Denard was arrested by police again after he was spotted by officers with a group of men in a green Jaguar. The officers had received a tip from an informant that the men were armed, court records state.

Denard was found with a shotgun in his pants and was arrested and charged with being a felon in possession of a gun. A month later, Denard took a plea deal in which he admitted violating his probation and was sent to jail.

Teresa Drenick, spokeswoman for the Alameda County District Attorney's Office, said Tuesday that the office decided to give Denard a deal based on the evidence collected during the investigation of his two crimes."