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1 – 10 of over 1000This research examines the direct and interactive effects of defendant race and sex on judicial decisions to utilize mitigating departures in cases involving felony drug…
Abstract
Purpose
This research examines the direct and interactive effects of defendant race and sex on judicial decisions to utilize mitigating departures in cases involving felony drug convictions in Virginia.
Methodology/approach
Logistic regression models are used to examine judicial decisions to depart downward in Schedule I & II, and Other (Schedule III, VI, and V), drug cases. The direct and interactive effects of race and sex on departure decisions are modeled separately for Schedule I & II and Other drug offenses.
Findings
Defendant race and sex exert both direct and interactive effects on decisions to sentence offenders below the guidelines for both drug categories. Cases involving Black and male defendants, relative to white and female defendants, are significantly less likely to result in mitigating departures for Schedule I & II, and Other drug, violations. The interaction models indicate that cases involving Black male defendants are less likely to result in mitigating departures than other cases, while cases involving white females have higher odds of receiving mitigating departures than other cases.
Originality/value
This chapter adds to the current literature on sentencing disparity by examining unwarranted sentencing disparity in Virginia, where scant research has been conducted. Furthermore, this research models decisions separately by drug category and examines both the direct and interactive effects of race and sex.
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This chapter presents four theories that hypothesize race/ethnicity disparities in sentence outcomes. Empirical studies assessing the relationship between defendant’s…
Abstract
Purpose
This chapter presents four theories that hypothesize race/ethnicity disparities in sentence outcomes. Empirical studies assessing the relationship between defendant’s race/ethnicity and sentence severity are discussed.
Methodology/approach
I focus on federal sentencing in terms of support or non-support of the theoretical perspectives.
Findings
Sentence disparity linked to defendant’s race/ethnicity are observed as net main effects, as a component in joint-conditioning effects with other extralegal defendant characteristics, and as a variable that conditions the effect of process-related mechanism of discretion, and legally relevant case characteristics, and as indirect effects.
Originality/value
Theories share substantial conceptual overlap in specifying the relationship between defendant’s race/ethnicity and predictions of the effect of defendant’s race/ethnicity on sentence severity.
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Accessing and distributing child pornography is an emerging problem. This paper aims to examine the judicial sentencing decisions of child pornography cases and whether they…
Abstract
Purpose
Accessing and distributing child pornography is an emerging problem. This paper aims to examine the judicial sentencing decisions of child pornography cases and whether they differ from decisions of child molestation cases.
Design/methodology/approach
Using a legal database of Canadian court judgments, the study examined sentencing decisions of 50 child pornography and 50 child molestation cases, identifying variables that were present in the judges' reasons for their decision.
Findings
The results revealed a disparity in sentencing that favours incarceration rather than community sentences for child molesters over child pornography cases. Despite what appears to be lighter sentences for child pornography offenders, judges were more likely to sanction treatment and recommend restrictions in cases of child pornography than child molestation. In light of the absence of literature exploring sentencing disparity among child sexual offences, further directions and suggestions for practice are discussed.
Practical implications
The examination of the disparity of sentencing decisions for child molesters and child pornography offenders and the identified variables that may contribute to these decisions suggests that the judiciary views child pornography and child molestation offenders differently and are more punitive toward contact offenders. Such disparity has implications for the criminal justice system.
Originality/value
This study offers the first exploration of sentencing disparity and decisions on child pornography and child molestation cases in Canada.
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Prior studies of criminal sentencing have largely focused on individual-level predictors of sentencing outcomes. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of a variety…
Abstract
Purpose
Prior studies of criminal sentencing have largely focused on individual-level predictors of sentencing outcomes. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of a variety of theoretically derived community measurements of social threat and disadvantage on the criminal sentencing of convicted felons. This analysis permits an evaluation of whether legal ideals such as equality before the law and policy goals of equal treatment for like offenders are achieved.
Design/methodology/approach
The study examines data of individuals sentenced in the state of Florida and community level measurements of racial and ethnic threat and community disadvantage. Hierarchical generalized linear model is used to analyze the effect of these measures on the dichotomous in/out imprisonment variable, and standard hierarchical linear regression analysis is used to model the continuous dependent variable of sentence length.
Findings
The results provide support for the racial threat perspective though not for ethnic threat nor community disadvantage. The findings and their implications are discussed in terms of theory, research and policy.
Practical implications
Racial disparity in criminal justice practices is receiving increasing public and policy attention, as evidenced by the growing Black Lives Matter movement. Regarding sentencing, racial disparity remains a major research and policy question. While the current research and theoretical literature on sentencing is not conclusive, it is clear that race matters. As a result, racial disparity in sentencing needs to be a priority in subsequent “transitional criminology” efforts between researchers and policy makers to identify, explain and ultimately predict exactly how race impacts sentencing, and how to reduce it as a consideration from sentencing.
Originality/value
This study contributes to a growing body of literature that examines the social context of punishments by using several community level measurements of threat and disadvantage, while modeling the two-step sentencing outcome of imprisonment and sentence length.
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Amy Kroska and Marshall R. Schmidt
We examine the effect of an offender’s occupational status on criminal sentencing recommendations using a vignette experiment that crosses the offender’s occupational status…
Abstract
Purpose
We examine the effect of an offender’s occupational status on criminal sentencing recommendations using a vignette experiment that crosses the offender’s occupational status (white-collar vs blue- or pink-collar) and the crime label, with one label (overcharging) associated with white-collar offenders and the other (robbery) associated with lower-status offenders. We expect negative and potent post-crime impressions of the offender and the crime to increase perceptions of criminality and, in turn, the recommended sentence. We term these negative and potent impressions “criminality scores.” Drawing on affect control theory (ACT) impression formation equations, we generate criminality scores for the offenders and the crimes in each condition and, using those scores as a guide, predict that white-collar offenders and offenders described as “robbing” will receive a higher recommended sentence. We also expect eight perceptual factors central to theories of judicial sentencing mediate these relationships.
Methodology
We test these hypotheses with a vignette experiment, administered to female university students, that varies a male offender’s occupation and the word used to describe his crime.
Findings
Consistent with our ACT-derived predictions, white-collar offenders and offenders described as robbing received a higher recommended sentence. But, contrary to predictions, only one perceptual factor, crime seriousness, mediated these effects, and the mediation was partial.
Research Implications
Our findings suggest the perpetrator’s post-crime appearance of negativity and power offer a valuable supplement to theories of judicial sentencing.
Originality
This study is the first to test the hypothesis that sentencing disparities may be due to the way the perpetrators’ sociodemographic attributes shape their post-crime appearance of negativity and power.
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Discussion of the 2016 electorate has centered on two poles: results of public opinion and voter surveys that attempt to tease out whether racial, cultural, or economic grievances…
Abstract
Discussion of the 2016 electorate has centered on two poles: results of public opinion and voter surveys that attempt to tease out whether racial, cultural, or economic grievances were the prime drivers behind the Trump vote and analyses that tie major shifts in the political economy to consequential shifts in the voting behavior of certain demographic and geographic groups. Both approaches render invisible a major development since the 1970s that has been transforming the political, social, and economic landscape of wide swaths of people who do not reside in major urban areas or their prosperous suburban rings: the emergence and consolidation of the carceral state. This chapter sketches out some key contours of the carceral state that have been transforming the polity and economy for poor and working-class people, with a particular focus on rural areas and the declining Rust Belt. It is meant as a correction to the stilted portrait of these groups that congealed in the aftermath of the 2016 election, thanks to their pivotal contribution to Trump's victory. This chapter is not an alternative causal explanation that identifies the carceral state as the key factor in the 2016 election. Rather, it is a call to aggressively widen the analytical lens of studies of the carceral state, which have tended to focus on communities of color in urban areas.
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The very contextual nature of most mitigating evidence runs counter to America’s individualistic culture. Prior research has found that capital jurors are unreceptive to most…
Abstract
The very contextual nature of most mitigating evidence runs counter to America’s individualistic culture. Prior research has found that capital jurors are unreceptive to most mitigating circumstances, but no research has examined the capital sentencing decisions of trial judges. This study fills that gap through a content analysis of eight judicial sentencing opinions from Delaware. The findings indicate that judges typically dismiss contextualizing evidence in their sentencing opinions and instead focus predominately on the defendant’s culpability. This finding calls into question the ability of guided discretion statutes to ensure the consideration of mitigation and limit arbitrariness in the death penalty.
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Ace Vo and Miloslava Plachkinova
The purpose of this study is to examine public perceptions and attitudes toward using artificial intelligence (AI) in the US criminal justice system.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to examine public perceptions and attitudes toward using artificial intelligence (AI) in the US criminal justice system.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors took a quantitative approach and administered an online survey using the Amazon Mechanical Turk platform. The instrument was developed by integrating prior literature to create multiple scales for measuring public perceptions and attitudes.
Findings
The findings suggest that despite the various attempts, there are still significant perceptions of sociodemographic bias in the criminal justice system and technology alone cannot alleviate them. However, AI can assist judges in making fairer and more objective decisions by using triangulation – offering additional data points to offset individual biases.
Social implications
Other scholars can build upon the findings and extend the work to shed more light on some problems of growing concern for society – bias and inequality in criminal sentencing. AI can be a valuable tool to assist judges in the decision-making process by offering diverse viewpoints. Furthermore, the authors bridge the gap between the fields of technology and criminal justice and demonstrate how the two can be successfully integrated for the benefit of society.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is among the first studies to examine a complex societal problem like the introduction of technology in a high-stakes environment – the US criminal justice system. Understanding how AI is perceived by society is necessary to develop more transparent and unbiased algorithms for assisting judges in making fair and equitable sentencing decisions. In addition, the authors developed and validated a new scale that can be used to further examine this novel approach to criminal sentencing in the future.
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