Cops offer plea bargains for minor offenders

In a bid to close a number of cases, Navi Mumbai Police have been offering plea bargains to the people involved in minor crimes like accidents. In this plea bargain, the police's prosecutor and defender of the accused agree upon an arrangement of a lesser punishment, considering the crime and the record of the person. A senior police official said, "Sometimes, it so happens that a person is caught without helmet or without a seatbelt, which might have been unintentional. In such cases, we offer a plea bargain, to increase the defaulter's faith in the system." The plea bargain, an agreement in a criminal case between the prosecutor and defendant whereby the defendant agrees to plead guilty to a particular charge in return for some concession from the prosecutor. Since Navi Mumbai is connected with the main city through highways, an increasing number of speeding, rash driving, riding triple seat, without helmet or driving without a seatbelt are recorded, which attracts a fine or a jail term of one/two years, depending on the nature of violation. In such cases, often the crimes are committed by mistake or unintentionally, which makes it wrong to punish them. To instil faith in the judiciary system, police meet the violator halfway after he/she accepts their fault and plead guilty.

A senior Navi Mumbai traffic official said, this practice also helps to close cases and end the violator’s anxiety, while bringing them on law’s side, which eventually becomes a win-win situation. The aim behind this practice is to make the violator realise that they were wrong, and there was still time to make amends and get on the right track.