The Effects of Pretrial Detention on Sentencing Outcomes

Patricio Dominguez and Leopoldo Lazcano ()
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Leopoldo Lazcano: Swedish Institute for Social Research, Postal: SOFI, Stockholm University, SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden

No 8/2025, SOFI Working Papers in Labour Economics from Stockholm University, Swedish Institute for Social Research

Abstract: Pretrial detention accounts for an important share of prison population around the globe and imposes detrimental consequences on defendants. We examine its impact on sentencing outcomes in Chile’s criminal justice system, where plea bargaining is a limited prosecution tool. Pretrial detention increases conviction probability from 53 to 76 percent. We also assess how this effect changed after a reform modified prosecution tools for a specific set of crimes (robberies). The impact of pretrial detention on conviction increases for robbery-related crimes while we observe no relevant changes for others. These findings highlight pretrial detention’s role in shaping criminal justice outcomes.

Keywords: pretrial detention; sentencing outcomes; plea bargaining; judge-IV design (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C26 D01 K42 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 57 pages
Date: 2025-05-15
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