Racial Disparities in the American Criminal Justice System: Essay

The criminal justice system is a set of organizations and procedures set up by governments to control wrongdoing and force punishments on the individuals who disregard the laws. The main frameworks are state and federal. The state criminal justice systems handle wrongdoings perpetrated inside their state limits and government, the federal criminal system handles violations carried out on federal property or in more than one state. This system is supposed to be equal yet the nature of offenses, differential policing policies and practices, sentencing laws and biases are possible contributors to disparities in the system. The severity of the offense, prior record, age and education level are also taking into account when a decision is being made. Our prison system today varies immensely with ascending numbers of minority groups jailed within the system. Racial and ethnic imbalances continue in the United States and no disparity is more evident than that found in the criminal justice system. Disparity usually refers to a difference that is unfair, disparity in the criminal justice system stems from racial disparity which concludes that the proportion of a racial ethnic group within the control of the system is greater than the population of that group outside that control.

There are large racial disparities in incarceration and related detainments for African Americans. They are more likely to be under the supervision of the Department of Corrections than any other racial or ethnic group (H.West, Sabol, & Greenman, 2010). Institutional racism is believed to be the reason why African Americans, especially males, are disproportionately represented in the criminal justice system. On balance, the public believes that discrimination against black people is based on the prejudice of the individual person, correlates to the discrimination built into the nation’s laws and institutions (Pew’s Research Center, 2017). This belief is actually supported through several experimental studies that provide evidence that African Americans are to be seen as more criminal and threatening than others thus more likely to be arrested or even shot (Greenwald, Oakes, & Hoffman, 2003). Racism within the criminal justice system very much exists and is still relevant.

In today’s society, discrimination continues to affect millions of minorities from inappropriate name calling to being shot by a law enforcement officer because you were perceived to be dangerous. The underlying effects of racial discrimination are seen in all aspects of our society, especially in our social institutions. These social institutions range from the educational system to our government, yet racial discrimination is more evident in the criminal justice system. When analyzing how the criminal justice system discriminates against minorities we are able to do so through the visible disparities within the system. Unfortunately, these disparities display African Americans having the highest population rates in the criminal justice system, therefore, we can immediately conclude this disparity in population is due to the injustices conducted by the system. Thus, there is a need for urgent change not just within the criminal justice system but within all social institutions beginning with our government. This change should create greater opportunities for minorities to enter the political field in our government as well as promoting higher participating in voting. Yet, the criminal justice system within all its aspects practices discrimination due to its deeply interwoven prejudice, institutional racism, and socioeconomic status.

Not only are there racial disparities throughout the criminal justice system as a whole, but in many different aspects of the system, ranging from adolescents to adults. This paper will provide two cases to compare White and African American racial disparities throughout the criminal justice system. This paper will provide overall statistics and discuss the government officials’ part in racial disparities between African Americans and Whites. Lastly, this paper will provide foster care statistics, overall juvenile statistics, and juvenile court statistics for racial disparities between African Americans and Whites. There is implicit bias throughout the system. It is not known because implicit bias is not expressed. Implicit bias is not even known because not only is implicit bias not expressed, but implicit bias comes from a person’s unconscious part of the brain.

Mac Donald (2008) looks at the idea that cops over arrest blacks and ignore the crimes that whites commit. However, the races of criminals that are reported by the victims do in fact match arrest data. According to a research study as far back as 1978, “a study of robbery and aggravated assault in eight cities found parity between the race of assailants in victim identifications and in arrests--a finding replicated many times since, across a range of crimes” (Mac Donald, 2008, p. 15). It does not make sense to think why crime victims would be biased in the reports they give to the police.

The basis for this issue stems from several causes. Policy, implicit bias, biased decision making, education and other structural disadvantages and criminal history are several of these causes. At several points during the justice system, African Americans are at a clear disadvantage that can lead to their imprisonment and consequently over imprisonment of the minority. It has been found that police officer’s decision to stop or pull-over was dictated heavily by racial composition of certain areas (31). Beyond this, it has been found that factors such as race and ethniticty influence sentencing decisions as well as prior record and crime severity (33) and that prosecuters are more likely to prosecute and place heavier sentencing on African Americans than Whites who have committed similar crimes.

Joan Petersilia (2000), in her report “Racial Disparities in the Criminal Justice System” to the US department of Justice shows the statistics on black arrests and incarcerations in USA. According to Joan, of the 12 percent of black population in US, almost 50 percent of the African Americans in major cities face an arrest for index offense in their lifetime as compared to only 14 percent of whites. Over 18 percent of black people in US serve a jail term as compared to a low number of whites, about 3 percent. A computerized information system known as Offender Based Transaction Statistics (OBTS) that analyses information of criminal processing from arrest to the sentencing stage shows a summary of male incarcerations in three states, Michigan, Texas and California. The data reveals that out of the crime committed through violence, 44 percent proportion of blacks are arrested out of which 53 percent of blacks are imprisoned. In the property crime, out of 29 percent proportion of blacks arrested, over 41 percent of blacks are imprisoned. Considering all the felonies, the proportion of African Americans arrested forms about 32 percent where the number imprisoned for the felonies is 48 percent (Joan,

More than half of the United States prison population is made up of African Americans and Latinos, this is nearly twice as their accumulated representation within thirty percent of the general population. As these minorities continue to be put in jail, the rates of racial disproportionality in the criminal justice system also continue to stagger. Crime commission, arrests, convictions, and sentencing are all apart of the many stages within

Race and the criminal justice system have always been a topic of discussion throughout numerous communities, groups and in America, in general. The African-American race in particular has always had controversy with the criminal justice system. From times before the Civil Rights Era to post-Civil Rights times, the African-American community has found it very difficult to build a long-lasting positive relationship with law enforcement. The African-American community has often felt like targets of law enforcement, pointing out many laws or policies that they feel specifically single them out. One of these laws is the crack-cocaine law.

Within the US justice system, there is a substantial disparity between the aggregate number of African American men living within the society, and living inside prison walls. African Americans men are frequently confronted with difficult environmental, financial and sociological disparities growing up, and also have the absence of opportunity weighing them down as well. Many of these factors have lead to outrageous numbers of African American males being incarcerated. Furthermore, the prejudicial behaviors by the judicial community can also be included as a factor in these incarceration statistics. Digging deeper, it is clear that crime and punishment are multidimensional issues that stem from racial prejudice that originate from racial partiality legitimized by age-old observations and convictions about African Americans. The United States has an affective double justice system that has kept up the monetary and social chain of command in America, in light of the oppression of blacks, inside the United States. Public policy, criminal justice, society and the media, and criminal conduct have every single assumed part in making and keeping this stigma alive. According to National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, African Americans contain about 1 million of the 2.3 million imprisoned populace. (NAACP, Criminal Justice Fact Sheet) Furthermore, the history of prejudice, which is additionally connected to the historical backdrop of view of race and crime, has

Though there are factors that have contributed to the higher incarceration rates of minorities throughout time, race its self, appears to be the primary factor in higher incarceration rates among minorities. Campbell et al., (2015) make an interesting observation, and point out that, “A considerable body of research has suggested that higher incarceration rates are linked to changes in race relations and that aggressive state action against crime serves as a proxy for racial conflict.” The change in race relations that stems from the civil rights era and prior appears to not only have a direct impact incarceration rates, but also the laws and policies that have been established to favor whites. Greenberg and West’s (2001) “findings highlighted

It is widely known that the United States is the number one country in the world with the highest incarceration rate. Race and ethnicity have a huge impact on the decisions that the criminal justice system makes. The competition between presidents of whom was more tougher on crime, the war on drugs, and the three strikes policy led the U.S. to a mass incarceration era with racial and ethnic disparities. According to Pager the war on drugs targeted African Americans the most (Pager 20). At this time, drug crimes were the perfect target to incarcerate more African American men. Since then, minority groups experience inequality and discrimination in the criminal justice system compared to the

The United States of America has the largest prison system in the world with over 2.2 million prisoners. 1,320,000 of those prisoners are blacks and hispanics. The justice system in the United States has unequal outcomes across racial groups. Although together they make up only 30% of the country’s population, black and hispanic men are 3 times more likely to end up behind bars for the same crime committed by white males, allowing them to make up 60% of the prison population. Private prisons, the War on Drugs and a civil rights crisis and are the main factors to why people of color are overrepresented in our prison systems.

African Americans constitute 1 million of the total 2.3 million incarcerated. Blacks are incarcerated nearly 6 times the rate of whites. African American and Hispanics comprised 58% of all prisoners (naacp). Human Rights Watch reported in 2000 that, in seven States, African

According to studies done by The Sentencing Project, America has experienced a 500% increase in prison populations over the last 40 years. Of the 2.3 million people incarcerated, 67% are People of Color (Mass Incarceration). This is a startling number, increasingly so when you consider that People of Color make up merely 23.1% of the population (US Census). These statistics paint a grim and confusing picture. How can a racial minority in our country have such an overwhelming presence in our prison system? In her book, The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander explains the narrative of events leading up to where we are today. And from there, we can illustrate how there is a racial bias in our criminal justice system.