Lily US History: Criminal Justice System In Class Writing

Criminal Justice System

I chose to research the criminal justice system, primarily because I found this topic very interesting when in the legacy museum. This sparked my interest when listening to the “phone calls” from the inmates and hearing about the unjust way they were being treated in prisons. For my research, I focused primarily on the discrepancy in sentencing according to race, but more specifically discrepancy in sentencing in juveniles due to race.

When I began my research I immediately found data that showed that there were numerous discrepancies in either how a black man or a white man was sentenced, how long they were sentenced, and even down to what percentage of jails were occupied by men of different races. This data showed that black and Latinos are at a much higher risk of being incarcerated for the same crime that a white man commits. Data also showed that this discrepancy increased as the severity of the sentencing increased. In 2009, black men made up around 13% of the United States, they also accounted for 28.3% of people serving life in prison, and 56.4% of people serving life without parole. Of those serving life without parole, 56.1% of them received this sentencing as a juvenile, which sparked my interest in juvenile incarceration rates.

The first bit of information that I found was that black youth with a white victim is significantly more likely to be sentenced to life without parole than white youth with a black victim. This was interesting to me because as a system, the criminal justice system is supposed to be a system of truth and honor and integrity and by either consciously or unconsciously being unfair to not only adults of color, but youth of color, then the system’s values mean absolutely nothing. And this type of bias whether it is unintentional or not has a significant effect on the outcome of many trials. In North Carolina there are 159 men of color on death row, of those, 31 were sentenced by all-white juries, not a single person of color on the jury to determine whether a man would lose his life or simply be sentenced to life in prison. 38 of the other inmates on death row were sentenced by a jury containing 1 person of color. As a country that has a deep history of racial bias, it is very important that the system is aware and takes account for the discrepancies in the way people are being sentenced to ensure that we don’t continue to allow these ways to continue.

When furthering my research I found that between 2001 and 2015, juvenile placement has decreased by 54%, this is most likely because we are beginning to see that being held in placement, primarily as a minor can causes serious psychological effects, that should not be imposed if the offender doesn’t necessarily pose as a threat to anyone else in society. However, white incarceration rates are falling faster than that of black youth, causing a worsening in the discrepancy. So while overall juvenile incarceration rates have decreased, racial disparity has increased by 22%. The data also shows that this isn’t because blacks are committing more crimes, but simply because they are “burdened by a presumption of guilt and dangerousness”(EJI)

Through all of my research I realized that there are most certainly injustices involved with our criminal justice system. While these aren’t problems we can fix overnight, because they truly do stem from our country’s extensive history of racial bias, they are problems that we should be more conscious of. In an interview with Joshua Rovner, a man who studies the criminal justice system he says: “The disparity exists because of difference in how young people of color are treated at every point of contact with the justice system, but the growth of the incarceration disparity is likely due to growing disparities is arrests which feeds the rest of the system”. As a country we need to be willing to step back and realize that as much as we would like to believe that racism has become completely nonexistent in our society, it is still extremely prevalent. It isn’t a problem that is going to go away if it is not addressed and it really is something that has to begin with a change in the system itself. A change that restores the morals of truth and justice and integrity to ensure that our country is being protected in the right ways.