Conviction rate

The conviction rate, expressed as a percentage, represents the proportion of cases resulting in a legal declaration of guilt for an offense, against the total number of trials completed. It is calculated by dividing the number of convictions by the total number of adjudicated cases and then multiplying by 100. A conviction is a legal declaration that someone is guilty of committing an offense, determined through a jury's or bench's verdict within a court of law.^[1]

Conviction rates reflect many aspects of the legal processes and systems at work within the jurisdiction, and are a source of both jurisdictional pride and broad controversy. Rates are often high, especially when presented in their most general form (i.e., without qualification regarding changes made to original charges, pleas that are negotiated, etc.). Rates across jurisdictions within countries can vary by tens of percentage points (e.g., across states within the U.S.). In other cases, they are uniformly high, although for distinct reasons (e.g., in China and Russia).

Introduction

The conviction rate of a prosecutor or government can be defined as the number of convictions divided by the number of criminal cases brought.^{[citation needed]}

Examples

Canada

In Canada, 2017–2018 data provided by Statistics Canada indicate an overall rate of conviction of 62% (of those charged in adult court). This is much lower than one might infer from the 3.6% acquittal rate because 1/3rd of the cases are withdrawn (either directly or indirectly via a "Crown Stay") before they reach a verdict. According to Canadian trial lawyer Kim Schofield, the effective conviction rate falls from 62% to approximately 50% if one excludes guilty pleas and deals.^[2]

China

In China, the conviction rate reached 99.975% in 2022, according to a Safeguard Defenders analysis of reports released by the Supreme People's Court and Supreme People's Procuratorate.^[3] NPR and The Economist reported overall conviction rates above 99%.^[4]^[5] In 2016, out of 1.2 million people tried, only 1,039 were found not guilty - an acquittal rate of around 0.08%.^[6] In 2013, the conviction rate reached 99.93%, with 825 people acquitted out of 1.16 million people put on trial.^[7] Several local protectorates in China have set a "zero acquittal policy," resulting in a negative performance evaluation for trials that end in acquittal. As a result, Chinese prosecutors tend to withdraw indictments at the pre-trial stage rather than risk acquittal.^[8]

India

The national conviction rate in India for offences of the Indian Penal Code is 57.0% in 2021,^[9] a statistic that varies state by state; the state with the highest conviction rate is Mizoram (96.7%), while the state with lowest rate is Assam (5.6%) in 2021.^[10]^[11]^[9] In 2022, the conviction rate of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) stood at 74.59%.^[12] In 2023, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) had a conviction rate of 94.70%.^[13] From 2014 to 2023, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) achieved a conviction rate of 93.54%, securing convictions in 29 out of 31 cases that completed trial.^[14]

Israel

The conviction rate in Israel is around 93%.^[when?] Around 72% of trials end with a conviction on some charges and acquittal on others, while around 22% end with a conviction on all charges. These statistics do not include plea bargains and cases where the charges are withdrawn, which make up the vast majority of criminal cases.^[15]

Japan

The conviction rate is 99.3%. By only stating this high conviction rate it is often misunderstood as too high—however, this high conviction rate drops significantly when accounting for the fact that Japanese prosecutors drop roughly half the cases they are given. If measured in the same way, the United States' federal conviction rate would be 99.8%.^[16]^[17]^[18]

In Japan, unlike in some other democracies, arrests require permission of judges except for cases such as arresting someone while committing a crime. Only significant cases with sufficient evidence are subject to indictment, since becoming a party to a criminal trial imposes a burden on a suspect; Japan's indictment ratio is only 37%—“99.3%” is the percentage of convictions divided by the number of indictments, not the criminals. As such, the conviction rate is high.^[19]

Russia

In 2018, the gross conviction rate in Russia was above 99%. In 2018, 0.25% of court cases ended in acquittal, compared with 0.3% in 2017 and 0.54% in 2014.^[20] Jury trials, where not guilty verdicts are more common, are rare.^[21] However this statistic does not take into account the 22–25% of cases that get dismissed prematurely.^[22] Instead, the Russian statistics consider the number of convictions out of the cases that have made it to the end, not being dismissed in the process. This is unlike other countries, where all non-convictions (like dismisses and acquittals) are combined into one statistic.

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has three prosecuting bodies that cover different geographic areas. The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service for Scotland. In Northern Ireland Public Prosecution Service for Northern Ireland (PPSNI) and in England and Wales most prosecutions are brought by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS). The figures for 2017–2018 in England and Wales show at Crown Court the conviction rate was 80.0% and at Magistrates Court the conviction rate was 84.8%.^[23] In Northern Ireland figures show at Crown Court the conviction rate for 2017–2018 was 87.2% and at Magistrates Court it was 79.0%.^[24]

United States

In the United States federal court system, the conviction rate rose from approximately 75 percent to approximately 85% between 1972 and 1992.^[25] For 2012, the US Department of Justice reported a 93% conviction rate.^[26] In 2000, the conviction rate was also high in U.S. state courts. Coughlan, writing in 2000, stated, "In recent years, the conviction rate has averaged approximately 84% in Texas, 82% in California, 72% in New York, 67% in North Carolina, and 59% in Florida."^[27]

In 2018, the Bureau of Justice Statistics reported that among defendants charged with a felony, 68% were convicted (59% of a felony and the remainder of a misdemeanor) with felony conviction rates highest for defendants originally charged with motor vehicle theft (74%), driving-related offenses (73%), murder (70%), burglary (69%), and drug trafficking (67%); and lowest for defendants originally charged with assault (45%).^[28]

There are frequent "guilty acceptance" plea deals in the United States. That said, the ostensible "conviction rate" may not be accurate because the charges are dropped.

References

^ APA (25 February 2020). "Update: Conviction Rates - Association of Prosecuting Attorneys". Association of Prosecuting Attorneys. Archived from the original on 8 April 2024. Retrieved 8 April 2024.
^ Harford, Tim (host), and Colin Jones and Kim Schofield (interviewees) (18 January 2020). More or Less: Japan's 99% Conviction Rate (Radio broadcast). London, UK: BBC. Event occurs at 5:21-8:46, esp. 6:23-7:02, 7:25-8:02. Archived from the original on 28 July 2020. Retrieved 21 January 2020.
^ "Prosecutions abandoned, conviction rate record high, and more on China's judiciary 2022". Safeguard Defenders. 2023-07-25. Archived from the original on 2024-05-16. Retrieved 2024-07-28.
^ Feng, Emily (June 25, 2024). "China convicts 99% of defendants in criminal trials. Reversing a conviction is hard". NPR. Archived from the original on June 26, 2024. Retrieved July 27, 2024.
^ "The nationalism of ideas". The Economist. July 25, 2024. ISSN 0013-0613. Retrieved 2024-07-28.
^ Connor, Neil (2016-03-14). "Chinese courts convict more than 99.9 per cent of defendants". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 2024-04-28. Retrieved 2024-07-28.
^ McCoy, Terrence (March 11, 2014). "China scored 99.9 percent conviction rate last year". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on September 19, 2023. Retrieved July 27, 2024.
^ Foundation, The Dui Hua. "Behind the Rarity of China's Acquittals". Archived from the original on 2022-03-08. Retrieved 2022-03-29.
^ ^a ^b "NCRB Crime Statistics 2021 Vol 3" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2022-11-30. Retrieved 2022-12-01.
^ Deccan Staff (4 December 2017). "Kerala's conviction rate double national average". Deccan Chronicle. Archived from the original on 26 August 2018. Retrieved 4 February 2019.
^ Tiwary, Deeptiman (8 August 2015). "Conviction rate up, Kerala tops with over 77%". TimesofIndia.com. Archived from the original on 25 February 2021. Retrieved 21 January 2020 – via TNN.
^ Press Trust of India (6 April 2023). "Conviction rate of CBI rises up to 74.59% in 2022 from 68% in 2018: Govt". Business Standard. Retrieved 8 April 2024.
^ Pandey, Devesh K. (31 December 2023). "NIA achieved 94.70% conviction rate in 2023". The Hindu. Archived from the original on 8 April 2024. Retrieved 8 April 2024.
^ Press Trust of India (24 July 2023). "Over 93% conviction rate in money laundering cases in 9 years: Govt". Business Standard. Archived from the original on 29 March 2024. Retrieved 8 April 2024.
^ Yahav, Telem (14 May 2012). "Study: Only 0.3% of criminal cases end with acquittal". Ynetnews. Archived from the original on 7 August 2018. Retrieved 4 February 2019.
^ http://justicedenied.org/issue/issue_67/federal_courts_jd67.pdf Archived 2022-01-11 at the Wayback Machine 99.8% Conviction Rate In U.S. Federal Courts Can Make Japanese Prosecutors Jealous
^ https://www.doarlaw.com/blog/2021/04/what-you-should-know-about-the-federal-governments-conviction-rate/ Archived 2021-09-01 at the Wayback Machine What you should know about the federal government’s conviction rate
^ https://thediplomat.com/2020/03/carlos-ghosn-and-japans-99-conviction-rate/ Archived 2022-06-28 at the Wayback Machine Carlos Ghosn and Japan’s ‘99% Conviction Rate’
^ http://www.moj.go.jp/EN/hisho/kouhou/20200115.html Response by MORI Masako, Minister of Justice, to the articles of the Wall Street Journal
^ Carroll, Oliver (May 29, 2019). "Russian justice system criticised after acquittal rate drops to 0.25%" Archived 2020-06-23 at the Wayback Machine The Independent.
^ Bennetts, Marc (August 14, 2017). "Russian conviction rate is higher than under Stalin" Archived 2020-06-22 at the Wayback Machine The Times.
^ "Российские суды прекращают уголовные дела каждого четвертого подсудимого". Российская газета (in Russian). Российская газета.
^ "Key measures". www.cps.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 2020-07-28. Retrieved 2020-01-21.
^ "Archived copy" (PDF). www.ppsni.gov.uk. Archived from the original (PDF) on 6 September 2018. Retrieved 17 January 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
^ Beale, Sara Sun, Federalizing Crime: Assessing the Impact on the Federal Courts, vol. 543, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
^ DOJ Staff (2012). "United States Attorneys' Annual Statistical Report for Fiscal Year 2012" (PDF). United States Department of Justice. Retrieved 28 October 2014.
^ Coughlan, Peter J. (June 2000), In Defense of Unanimous Jury Verdicts: Mistrials, Communication, and Strategic Voting, vol. 94, The American Political Science Review, pp. 375–393
^ BJS Staff. "FAQ Detail: What is the probability of conviction for felony defendants?". Bureau of Justice Statistics. Archived from the original on 18 January 2020. Retrieved 21 January 2020.