Court Opinion

ID: 9427037
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:19:30.928647+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:04.533635
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Powell,
dissenting.
Although I agree with much of the Court’s opinion, I am not satisfied that the result in this case is just or that the *369conduct of the plea bargaining met the requirements of due process.
Respondent was charged with the uttering of a single forged check in the amount of $88.30. Under Kentucky law, this offense was punishable by a prison term of from 2 to 10 years, apparently without regard to the amount of the forgery. During the course of plea bargaining, the prosecutor offered respondent a sentence of five years in consideration of a guilty plea. I observe, at this point, that five years in prison for the offense charged hardly could be characterized as a generous offer. Apparently respondent viewed the offer in this light and declined to accept it; he protested that he was innocent and insisted on going to trial. Respondent adhered to this position even when the prosecutor advised that he would seek *370a new indictment under the State’s Habitual Criminal Act which would subject respondent, if convicted, to a mandatory life sentence because of two prior felony convictions.
The prosecutor’s initial assessment of respondent’s case led him to forgo an indictment under the habitual criminal statute. The circumstances of respondent’s prior convictions are relevant to this assessment and to my view of the case. Respondent was 17 years old when he committed his first offense. He was charged with rape but pleaded guilty to the lesser included offense of “detaining a female.” One of the other participants in the incident was sentenced to life imprisonment. Respondent was sent not to prison but to a reformatory where he served five years. Respondent’s second offense was robbery. This time he was found guilty by a jury and was sentenced to five years in prison, but he was placed on probation and served no time. Although respondent’s prior convictions brought him within the terms of the Habitual Criminal Act, the offenses themselves did not result in imprisonment; yet the addition of a conviction on a charge involving $88.30 subjected respondent to- a mandatory sen-? tence of imprisonment for life.1 Persons convicted of rape and murder often are not punished so severely.
No explanation appears in the record for the prosecutor’s decision to escalate the charge against respondent other than respondent’s refusal to plead guilty. The prosecutor has conceded that his purpose was to discourage respondent’s assertion of constitutional rights, and the majority accepts this characterization of events. See ante, at 358 n. 1, 364.
It seems to me that the question to be-asked under the circumstances is whether the prosecutor reasonably might have charged respondent under the Habitual Criminal Act in the first place. The deference that courts properly accord the *371exercise of a prosecutor’s discretion perhaps would foreclose judicial criticism if the prosecutor originally had sought an indictment under that Act, as unreasonable as it would have seemed.2 But here the prosecutor evidently made a reasonable, responsible judgment not to subject an individual to a mandatory life sentence when his only new offense had societal implications as limited as those accompanying the uttering of a single $88 forged check and when the circumstances of his prior convictions confirmed the inappropriateness of applying the habitual criminal statute.3 I think it may be inferred that the prosecutor himself deemed it unreasonable and not in the public interest to put this defendant in jeopardy of a sentence of life imprisonment.
There may be situations in which a prosecutor would be fully justified in seeking a fresh indictment for a more serious offense. The most plausible justification might be that it would have been reasonable and in the public interest initially *372to have charged the defendant with the greater offense. In most cases a court could not know why the harsher indictment was sought, and an inquiry into the prosecutor's motive would neither be indicated nor likely to be fruitful. In those cases, I would agree with the majority that the situation would not differ materially from one in which the higher charge was brought at the outset. See ante, at 360-361.
But this is not such a case. Here, any inquiry into the prosecutor’s purpose is made unnecessary by his candid acknowledgment that he threatened to procure and in fact procured the habitual criminal indictment because of respondent's insistence on exercising his constitutional rights. We have stated in unequivocal terms, in discussing United States v. Jackson, 390 U. S. 570 (1968), and North Carolina v. Pearce, 395 U. S. 711 (1969), that “Jackson and Pearce are clear and subsequent cases have not dulled their force: if the only objective of a state practice is to discourage the assertion of constitutional rights it is patently unconstitutional.' ” Chaffin v. Stynchcombe, 412 U. S. 17, 32 n. 20 (1973). And in Brady v. United States, 397 U. S. 742 (1970), we drew a distinction between the situation there approved and the "situation where the prosecutor or judge, or both, deliberately employ their charging and sentencing powers to induce a particular defendant to tender a plea of guilty.” Id., at 751 n. 8.
The plea-bargaining process, as recognized by this Court, is essential to the functioning of the criminal-justice system. It normally affords genuine benefits to defendants as well as to society. And if the system is to work effectively, prosecutors must be accorded the widest discretion, within constitutional limits, in conducting bargaining. Cf. n. 2, supra. This is especially true when a defendant is represented by counsel and presumably is fully advised of his rights. Only’in the most exceptional case should a court conclude that the scales of the bargaining are so unevenly balanced as to arouse suspicion. In this case, the prosecutor’s actions denied respondent due *373process because their admitted purpose was to discourage and then to penalize with unique severity his exercise of constitutional rights. Implementation of a strategy calculated solely to deter the exercise of constitutional rights is not a constitutionally permissible exercise of discretion. I would affirm the opinion of the Court of Appeals on the facts of this case.

 It is suggested that respondent will be eligible for parole consideration after serving 15 years.

 The majority suggests, ante, at 360-361, that this case cannot be distinguished from the case where the prosecutor initially obtains an indictment under an enhancement statute and later agrees to drop the enhancement charge in exchange for a guilty plea. I would agree that these two situations would be alike only if it were assumed that the hypothetical prosecutor’s decision to charge under the enhancement statute was occasioned not by consideration of the public interest but by a strategy to discourage the defendant from exercising his constitutional rights. In theory, I would condemn both practices. In practice, the hypothetical situation is largely 'unreviewable. The majority’s view confuses the propriety of a particular exercise of prosecutorial discretion with its unreviewability. In the instant case, however, we have no problem of proof.

 Indeed, the Kentucky Legislature subsequently determined that the habitual criminal statute under which respondent was convicted swept too broadly and did not identify adequately the kind of prior convictions that should trigger its application. At least one of respondent’s two prior convictions would not satisfy the criteria of the revised statute; and the impact of the statute, when applied, has been reduced significantly in situations, like this one, where the third offense is relatively minor. See ante, at 359 n. 2.