Fox hands a pilot sentence to "Pleading Guilty"

 Fox gave a pilot greenlight on Monday to "Pleading Guilty," a legal drama based on the novel by Scott Turow.

Project comes from Peter Chernin's new production shingle, and reps the first full-fledged pilot order for the new company. Chernin has several production commitments from Fox, which this would fall under.

Chernin's TV division, run by Katherine Pope, has several more projects still in contention at Fox (as well as CBS).

Jon Avnet is directing the pilot for "Pleading Guilty" and will exec produce. Jason Tracey, who wrote the script, is on board as a co-exec producer.

Chernin and Pope are exec producers as well.

"Pleading Guilty" centers on an ex-cop-turned-lawyer who is charged with figuring out what happened to his law firm's star litigator -- as well as the millions of dollars that were tied to a class action lawsuit against the firm's biggest client.