Should I take the plea deal or go to trial?

This is the most consequential decision in a criminal case and the one most often made on incomplete information.

What you need before deciding. Discovery, reviewed. Depositions taken where they matter. Any suppression issue identified and, ideally, litigated. Your exposure at trial calculated — not guessed. And the collateral consequences of the offered plea understood: immigration, employment, licensing, firearms, sealing eligibility.

What shouldn't drive it. An offer described as expiring. A desire to end the uncertainty. A belief that going to trial angers the court. And most commonly, not knowing what the alternative actually is.

The honest framing. Most cases resolve by plea, and many pleas are good outcomes. The question isn't whether pleas are bad — it's whether this plea, on this evidence, with these consequences, is better than what a trial realistically produces.

That calculation requires knowing what the State can actually prove. Which means the answer usually isn't available at the moment the offer first arrives.