' is a legal term that comes from the

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

phrase for "I do not wish to contend". It is also referred to as a

plea In legal terms, a plea is simply an answer to a claim made by someone in a criminal case under common law using the adversarial system. Colloquially, a plea has come to mean the assertion by a defendant at arraignment, or otherwise in response ...

of no contest or no defense. In criminal

trials In law, a trial is a coming together of parties to a dispute, to present information (in the form of evidence) in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to adjudicate claims or disputes. One form of tribunal is a court. The tribun ...

in certain United States jurisdictions, it is a plea where the defendant neither admits nor disputes a

charge Charge or charged may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Films * '' Charge, Zero Emissions/Maximum Speed'', a 2011 documentary Music * ''Charge'' (David Ford album) * ''Charge'' (Machel Montano album) * ''Charge!!'', an album by The Aqu ...

, serving as an alternative to a pleading of

guilty Guilty or The Guilty may refer to: * Guilt (emotion), an experience that occurs when a person believes they have violated a moral standard Law *Culpability, the degree to which an agent can be held responsible for action or inaction *Guilt (law) ...

or not guilty. A no-contest plea, while not technically a guilty plea, typically has the same immediate effect as a guilty plea and is often offered as a part of a plea bargain. In many jurisdictions, a plea of ' is not a typical

right Rights are legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical ...

and carries various restrictions on its use.

United States

In the United States, state law determines whether, and under what circumstances, a defendant may plead no contest in state criminal cases. In federal court, the

Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure The Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure are the procedural rules that govern how federal criminal prosecutions are conducted in United States district courts and the general trial courts of the U.S. government. They are the companion to the Federa ...

only allow a ' plea to be entered with the court's consent; before accepting the plea, the court is required to "consider the parties' views and the public interest in the effective administration of justice".

Residual effects

A ' plea has the same immediate effects as a plea of guilty, but may have different residual effects or consequences in future actions. For instance, a conviction arising from a ' plea is subject to any and all penalties, fines, and forfeitures of a conviction from a guilty plea in the same case, and can be considered as an aggravating factor in future criminal actions. However, unlike a guilty plea, a defendant in a ' plea may not be required to allocute the charges. This means that a ' conviction typically may not be used to establish either negligence ''per se'', malice, or whether the acts were committed at all in later civil proceedings related to the same set of facts as the criminal prosecution. Under the

Federal Rules of Evidence First adopted in 1975, the Federal Rules of Evidence codify the evidence law that applies in United States federal courts. In addition, many states in the United States have either adopted the Federal Rules of Evidence, with or without local v ...

, and in those states whose rules of evidence are similar or identical to them, ' pleas may not be used to defeat the

hearsay Hearsay evidence, in a legal forum, is testimony from an under-oath witness who is reciting an out-of-court statement, the content of which is being offered to prove the truth of the matter asserted. In most courts, hearsay evidence is inadmiss ...

prohibition if offered as an "admission by party-opponent". Assuming the appropriate gravity of the charge, and all other things being equal, a guilty plea to the same charge would cause the reverse effect: An opponent at trial could introduce the plea, over a hearsay objection, as evidence to establish a certain fact.

Alaska

Alaska Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U.S. ...

, a criminal conviction based on a ' plea may be used against the defendant in future civil actions. The

Alaska Supreme Court The Alaska Supreme Court is the state supreme court for the U.S. state of Alaska. Its decisions are binding on all other Alaska state courts, and the only court its decisions may be appealed to is the Supreme Court of the United States. The Alas ...

ruled in 2006 that a "conviction based on a no contest plea will collaterally estop the criminal defendant from denying any element in a subsequent civil action against him that was necessarily established by the conviction, as long as the prior conviction was for a serious criminal offense and the defendant in fact had the opportunity for a full and fair hearing".

California

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

, a ' plea is known as a ''West plea'' after a seminal case involving plea bargains, ''People v. West'' (1970) 3 Cal.3d 595. The state Board of Pharmacy considers a plea of ' to be deemed a conviction with regard to issuing licenses for pharmacies, pharmacists and drug wholesalers. A ''nolo contendere'' plea to any felony is considered exactly equivalent to a guilty plea for the purposes of civil actions; this plea to any non-felony is not admissible to a civil action.

Florida

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

, the Supreme Court held in 2005 that no-contest convictions may be treated as prior convictions for the purposes of future sentencing.

Michigan

Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...

, "A ''nolo contendere'' plea does not admit guilt, it merely communicates to the court that the criminal defendant does not wish to contest the state's accusations and will acquiesce in the imposition of punishment." A ''nolo contendere'' plea may be appropriate "where the defendant would not be able to supply a sufficient factual basis for a guilty plea because he or she was intoxicated on the night of the incident, where there is the possibility of future civil litigation resulting from the offense, or where a defendant cannot remember the events which led to his or her being charged with a crime". A no contest plea prevents the court from eliciting a defendant's admission of guilt, but the result of the defendant's plea not to contest the charges against him or her is the same as if the defendant had admitted guilt. If a defendant pleads no contest to a charged offense, with the exception of questioning the defendant about his or her role in the charged offense, the court must proceed in the same manner as if the defendant had pleaded guilty. A plea of no contest to a felony offense requires the court's consent. A defendant's no contest plea to criminal charges does not ''estop'' that defendant from denying responsibility in a later civil action arising from the same conduct.Lichon, 435 Mich at 417.

Texas

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

, the right to appeal the results of a plea bargain taken from a plea of either ' or "guilty" is highly restricted. Defendants who have entered a plea of ' may only appeal the judgment of the court if the appeal is based on written pretrial motions ruled upon by the court.

Virginia

The

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

Rules of Evidence differ from the parallel federal rules in that a ' plea entered in a criminal case is admissible in a related civil proceeding.

Commonwealth

In the

Commonwealth countries The Commonwealth of Nations is a voluntary association of 56 sovereign states. Most of them were British colonies or dependencies of those colonies. No one government in the Commonwealth exercises power over the others, as is the case in a p ...

— such as England and Wales, Scotland, Canada, and Australia — the plea of ' is not permitted. The defendant must enter a plea of "guilty" or "not guilty". If a defendant refuses to enter a plea, the court will record a plea of "not guilty".

References

"Drunk driver who pled no contest can't relitigate issue of recklessness"
''All Business'', December 18, 2006, retrieved April 22, 2010 {{criminal procedure Pleas Latin legal terminology