Statistically the rich don't do any better than anyone who can afford a lawyer. The people who get screwed are the ones relying on court-appointed counsel. They do significantly worse.
Guessing this is conditional on getting brought to trial right? A prosecutor is going to bring a murder charge no matter who the suspect is, but that Senator's son's DUI? Or that four star general sharing classified information with his mistress? Might get pled for chump change or charges mgbt get dropped.
Most people who own a house or have savings or have family can scrape together enough money to engage a lawyer. How much that actually costs depends on the charge.
So many cases are pled out these days (98% at the federal level), I doubt more than a tiny percentage of defendants are spending anything like $100k.
It's possible that white collar crime is just hard to prosecute in general, but poor people have less opportunity to commit white collar crime. So what we really need to do is make white collar crime more accessible. /s?
