News broke last week that lawyer Sidney Powell, who promoted wild conspiracy theories in support of former President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, had pleaded guilty and agreed to testify …

Sidney Powell has agreed to plea guilty for her efforts to overturn the 2020 election, but that doesn’t mean she’s going to flip on Trump.

  • atzanteol@sh.itjust.works
    5·
    11 months ago

    I believe the judge will have some limits set on what she can say, and she won’t be able to talk about details of the case.

    I dunno - the deal is with the prosecution not the judge if I understand correctly… And judges can’t limit speech arbitrarily as people are finding out with Trump’s gag orders. I suppose we’ll find out soon though. If she has violated any court order she’ll likely be pulled back in to face the judge.

    • ChunkMcHorkle@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      11 months ago

      I dunno - the deal is with the prosecution not the judge if I understand correctly

      Once charges have been brought, a judge is assigned, and in the US nothing happens in that case without that judge knowing and explicitly approving it, including plea deals. There is no such thing as a prosecution-only deal for which a judge assigned to the case cannot set additional requirements.

      • atzanteol@sh.itjust.works
        1·
        11 months ago

        That doesn’t sound right… According to Cornell:

        In some jurisdictions, prosecutors and defendants can work with judges to predetermine what sentence the defendants will get if the defendants accept plea bargains. In most jurisdictions, however, judges’ role in plea bargaining is limited. For example, federal judges retain final authority over sentencing decisions, and are not bound by prosecutors’ recommendations, even if the recommendations are part of plea bargains.

        So the court can still sentence the party pleading guilty as they like but it sounds like they don’t typically have anything to do with the plea deal itself.

        They also play a role in enforcement:

        Courts treat plea bargains as contracts between prosecutors and defendants. A defendant breaking a plea bargain is akin to a breach of contract, which will result in the prosecutor no longer being bound by his or her obligation in the plea deal.

        • ChunkMcHorkle@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          11 months ago

          You seem to have mistaken active “plea bargaining” with finished and accepted “plea deal” which is ALWAYS finalized by the judge. Without the judge, there is no acceptance.

          There is a hearing, the judge is presented with a plea deal, both sides as well as the defendant are directly quizzed in regard to the content of the plea, its conditions and whatever the defendant has sworn to provide, and as a part of that the judge can accept, reject, or ask the two sides to work on it further.

          In practice, this means that whatever amendments the judge wants as a condition for accepting the plea, the judge gets, OR the plea in its present form is scrapped and prosecution proceeds or the two sides go back to the bargaining table.

          Read your quotes again. They literally do not say anything different than I just described.