plea bargain

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• intransitive verb To agree to plead guilty, especially to a lesser criminal offense, in exchange for some concession from the prosecution, such as dismissal of more serious charges.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• noun US, law An agreement in which a defendant agrees to plead guilty to a lesser charge instead of not guilty to a greater one

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• noun (criminal law) a negotiation in which the defendant agrees to enter a plea of guilty to a lesser charge and the prosecutor agrees to drop a more serious charge