Harmonisation of the Mechanisms for Implementing Plea Bargaining in Money-Laundering Cases to Achieve Speedy, Simple and Affordable Justice in Indonesia

This normative comparative study assesses the legal limits of the guilty-plea mechanism in Article 78 of Indonesia’s Law No. 20 of 2025, especially its possible application to money-laundering prosecutions. The analysis contrasts Indonesia’s statutory conditions with US Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11 and Germany’s section 257c StPO, focusing on eligibility, judicial scrutiny, legal representation, factual verification, and third-party asset rights. The Indonesian mechanism should not be equated with unrestricted US plea bargaining: the statutory offence thresholds and procedural guarantees remain controlling. Any extension to otherwise ineligible laundering offences requires legislative amendment, not judicial inference alone. The proposed model separates a voluntary plea from independent proof of illicit proceeds, asset recovery, and protection of victims and bona fide third parties.