What happens after a charge

The usual sequence

• Charge: in England and Wales the person receives a charge sheet setting out the offence ¹.
• Release or custody: police decide whether to release the person until the hearing, with or without bail conditions, or keep them in custody until they are taken to court ¹.
• First hearing: in England and Wales the first hearing is at a magistrates' court, even if the trial will later be at the Crown Court ¹. In the US federal courts a judge advises the defendant of the charges and decides whether to hold the defendant until trial ³.
• Plea: at arraignment the defendant enters a plea to the charges ³.
• Trial or plea agreement: a guilty plea may be exchanged for the government dropping some charges or recommending a lighter sentence. If the plea is not guilty, a trial is scheduled ³.
• Verdict and sentence: after a guilty verdict or plea, a US federal judge often waits for a presentence report from the probation office before sentencing ³.

England and Wales

Minor offences can be dealt with by a single justice procedure notice, which must be answered within 21 days, in place of attending court ¹. People under 18 usually have their first hearing at a youth court ¹.

Court delays are measured by the Ministry of Justice. In April to June 2026, the median time from charge to completion was 189 days at the Crown Court and 50 days at the magistrates' courts ². The median time from offence to completion was 365 days at the Crown Court ². The Crown Court guilty plea rate was 61% ².

Open caseloads reached series peaks at the end of June 2026, with 380,230 open cases at the magistrates' courts and 80,829 at the Crown Court ². 23,706 Crown Court cases had been open for a year or more, 31% of all open cases ². The ineffective trial rate was 25% at the Crown Court in the quarter and 20% at the magistrates' courts ².

United States federal courts

The federal courts say more than 90 percent of defendants plead guilty rather than go to trial ³. In fiscal year 2025, which ended on 30 September 2025, terminations of criminal defendants, including defendants transferred to other districts, rose 10 percent to 82,135. Excluding transfers, terminations were reported for 82,042 defendants. Of these, 76,514 (93 percent) were convicted, 75,151 of them by pleading guilty ⁴. Total criminal trials fell 3 percent to 6,774, of which 5,266 were non-jury trials and 1,508 were jury trials ⁴.

Before trial there is discovery and there can be motions, such as motions to suppress evidence ³. If a defendant is found not guilty, the government may not appeal, and the defendant cannot be charged again for the same offense in federal court ³.

Australia

The Australian Bureau of Statistics counted 521,632 defendants finalised in criminal courts in the 2024-25 financial year, up 1% on the year before ⁵. Of defendants with a court judgement, 97% (451,045) had a guilty outcome ⁵. The median case duration was 9 weeks ⁵.

What the numbers do and do not show

A conviction rate counts cases that ended in the period. It does not count cases still open. In England and Wales 80,829 cases were open at the Crown Court at the end of June 2026 ². The US figures on this page come from the federal district courts only ⁴. The Australian figures count defendants finalised in the 2024-25 financial year ⁵.