On the Realization Path of Effective Legal Assistance by Duty Lawyers in Cases of Pleading Guilty and Accepting Punishments With Leniency

The judgment criteria for effective legal assistance by duty lawyers in plea bargaining cases should adopt the “behaviorism” standard, and specific behaviors arise from the subjective and objective normative analysis of the voluntary nature of plea bargaining. By examining the current operational status of the duty lawyer system based on judgment criteria, it can be concluded that duty lawyers have failed to provide effective legal assistance due to the lack of supervision over duty lawyers, incomplete litigation rights, non-standard work procedures of case handling agencies, and insufficient incentives for duty lawyer work. It is necessary to establish a scientific and reasonable regulatory system based on judgment criteria, improve the litigation rights of duty lawyers from aspects such as the right to review cases and the right to participate in sentencing negotiation procedures, reduce obstacles brought by case handling agencies from aspects such as strengthening the timeliness of duty lawyers’ intervention in cases and ensuring their right to meet, and establish differentiated material and spiritual incentive mechanisms in order for duty lawyers to provide effective legal assistance.