California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from People v. Armendariz, 16 Cal.App.4th 906, 20 Cal.Rptr.2d 311 (Cal. App. 1993):
"While no bargain or agreement can divest the court of the sentencing discretion it inherently possesses [citation], a judge who has accepted a [16 Cal.App.4th 911] plea bargain is bound to impose a sentence within the limits of that bargain. [Citation.] 'A plea agreement is, in essence, a contract between the defendant and the prosecutor to which the court consents to be bound.' [Citations.] Should the court consider the plea bargain to be unacceptable, its remedy is to reject it, not to violate it, directly or indirectly. [Citation.] Once the court has accepted the terms of the negotiated plea, '[it] lacks jurisdiction to alter the terms of a plea bargain so that it becomes more favorable to a defendant unless, of course, the parties agree.' [Citation.]" (People v. Ames (1989) 213 Cal.App.3d 1214, 1217, 261 Cal.Rptr. 911.)
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