noting that a nolo contendere plea is designed “to protect a criminal defendant from use of the plea as an admission of the defendant’s guilt or liability in a civil proceeding”
How later courts described this case
- noting that a nolo contendere plea is designed “to protect a criminal defendant from use of the plea as an admission of the defendant’s guilt or liability in a civil proceeding”
- Interpreted the word "conviction," as used in the applicable regulation, to include a conviction based upon a plea of no contest, and permitted termination of medicaid provider's right to participate in medicaid program based upon a finding that the provider had been "convicted" of mail fraud charges relating to his participation in the medicaid program
- upholding use of nolo contendere plea because the operative fact is the conviction and not the nature of the plea
- “A plea of nolo contendere, when accepted by the court, is, in its effect upon the case, equivalent to a plea of guilty.... The judgment of conviction follows upon such plea as well as upon a plea •of guilty.” (quoting Commonwealth v. Ferguson, 44 Pa.Super. 626, 628 (1910))
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
CONCURRING OPINION
McDERMOTT, Justice.
The advantage of a plea of nolo contendere is that a defendant may contest his guilt to all others except the court before which he pleads. There he suffers conviction, a conviction like all others, to which all appropriate sanctions may be imposed. In the instant case had the regulation 1 provided that a conviction alone was ground for revocation, a conviction under the plea would be sufficient. The regulation however is “may” and not “shall”. Hence, I reluctantly agree that he is entitled to be heard.
. 55 Pa.Code § 1011.81(b)(3)-(4).