Effect of an Alford (no contest) plea

On Oct 22, 7:51 am, Roughrider50 <corky...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> what's the benefit of an
> Alford plea on top of a deferred adjudication? In my non-legalize way
> of thinking a deferred adjudication should negate any benefit of an
> Alford plea.

Apples and oranges.   The main benefit of an Alford plea (in which the defendant does not admit guilt, but admits that the state has enough evidence to convict) is that it does not serve as admissible evidence (an admission of a party opponent) in a subsequent civil suit for damages by the victim.

An Alford plea has no effect on and no relation to the ultimate criminal punishment/sentence, which (depending on the judge, and the deal worked out with the prosecutor) is the same as if entered upon a guilty plea.   If you had pleaded guilty and gotten the same deferred adjudication of your criminal conviction (so that it would be ultimately dismissed and not show up on your record), you still would have had the risk that the other party in the accident (if it was an accident) could sue you, and use your guilty plea in evidence.

In most states a plea is admissible  in the subsequent civil case (as something you yourself admitted), but the fact of a conviction is not (since the civil litigant has the burden of proving his own case from his own evidence, not just relying on the criminal result).

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