NCJ Number
245032
Date Published
August 2013
Length
30 pages
Annotation
This report chronicles the racial disparity that permeates each stage of the United States criminal justice system, from arrest to trial to sentencing.
Abstract
This report highlights the influence of implicit racial bias and recounts the findings of the current burgeoning scholarship on the role of such bias in the criminal justice system. Sections of this report cover topics, such as: racial disparity in police activity; racial disparity in trials, including indigent defense counsel, prosecution, and juries, trial judges, and presumptions of innocence; racial disparity in sentencing, including capital punishment, and the War on Drugs; and discretion, racial bias, and the Supreme Court. Finally, the report offers recommendations on ways that Federal, State, and local officials in the United States can work to eliminate racial disparity in the criminal justice system and uphold its obligations under the Covenant.