CCJ4662 exam 2

who is angela davis and what does she do?

the author of Policing the Black Man and she was a director at the D.C. public defender service and is now a professor of law at the American University. she has written several books on criminal law and procedure

According to Davis, how long have black boys and men been unlawfully killed by police and others sworn to uphold the law?

Since 1619 when the first slaves arrived in Jamestown, leading to lynchings, police killings and mass incarcerations

who was Trayvon Martin?

a seventeen year old boy that was shot and killed by George Zimmerman for walking through his own neighborhood at night “suspiciously”

what were the events that inspired the phrase “black lives matter”

The death of Trayvon Martin especially after Zimmerman was almost not tried for the murder and even after being tried was acquitted by the jury.

according to Davis, chapters of the social justice movement “black lives matter” are found where?

throughout the United States and Canada

What evidence does the author provide to illustrate that black males and other marginalized groups experience the “most of the best, least of the worst” in the CJS?

they feel the least of the best and most of the worst through disparities in the frequency of police stops, search and arrest being higher than their similar white counterparts. the harsher and more frequent experience happens throughout the entire legal system

How does Davis describe the arrest rates for Black Boys and Black Men?

They are disproportionately arrested and detained than when compared to the population size and the frequency of white counterparts. black boys it is 9.3 times more likely to be detained and black men are 2.5 times more likely to be arrested and 49% are arrested once before they are 23 years old

What demographic group is more likely to be killed during a police encounter?

African Americans are 21 times more likely to be killed by police than white people

Which demographic group are killed the most by law enforcement?

African Americans are more likely and among them 95% of the victims are male

Who is Bryan Stevenson and what does he do?

He is a lawyer who sat in his car listening to music and had the police called on him, the police got him out of his car at gun point, they detained and illegally searched his car while humiliating him in front of his neighbors and then was told that he was lucky when being let go.

What evidence does the author present to illustrate the origins of stereotypical options of innate black criminality ? What are the consequences?

that the police officers said he was lucky and he agreed due to the fact that black men often have this presumption of guilt and dangerousness put upon them by racial stereotypes that lead to historic failure in curing racial inequality both in society and its institution systems

Why does Stevenson argue that the issue of racially motivated police violence or racial disparities in sentencing cannot be viewed as a consequence of bad police officers or racially biased judges?

the deep historical forces that have created the problems so clearly in the American Legal System

According to Stevenson, what defining feature emerged that that would shape the cultural, social, political, and economic development of the US?

color

According to Stevenson, what was the impact of genocide on the indigenous tribal people in America?

the native population was decimated by disease, war, violence, and forced migration

According to Stevenson, what is the relationship between slavery in America and the contemporary ideology of white supremacy?

the idea that white people are the superior race and are so much smarter and so in the way a parent takes care of a child, white people must take care of black people, as McWillie said if not for the white people they would be barbarians but slavery allows them to be useful to white people

it created a mythology that there was racial inferiority to legitimate, perpetuate, and defend slavery and the ideology endures even to today

According to Stevenson, where did the racialized caste system of America originate?

the British colonies

What was Governor William McWillie’s position on anti-slavery? Did McWillie find slavery contradictory to the beliefs of Christianity?

he believed that white people were causing order and taking care of black people by enslaving them and that they were being elevated by the white people to be more civilized/ christianized. He believed that it was the Christian duties to help black people and the best way to do that was to leave them in the same position as they are (slaves) so that they are securely in the supervision of the civilized white people.

According to Stevenson, did the ending of slavery get rid of the racist ideology created to defend it?

it did nothing to actually change the ideology but in fact left them free to starve and die

How many southern states seceded from the Union to form the Confederate States of America? What was the consequence?

eleven states; which sparked the Civil War

According to Stevenson, what was President Lincolns personal position on slavery?

he was in favor of gradual process of compensated emancipation and voluntary colonization that would immigrate black people back to Africa

According to Stevenson, when did President Lincoln sign the Emancipation Proclamation and what were the immediate results? Did it apply to all states?

It only was for those enslaved in the confederate states to be free so immediately nothing and took an extremely long time for the news to actually reach them.

According to Stevenson, When did the formal nationwide codification of emancipation occur? What was the loophole?

December 1965 with the ratification of the 13th amendment and the loophole was that forced labor could be used as punishment for a crime

According to Stevenson, what were the consequences of the legal instruments that led to the formal end of racialized chattel slavery? In other words, what did it fail to do?

they did nothing to address the heirarchy in America or the ideology of racial equality that allowed for slavery in the first place.

What was Convict leasing?

the practice of selling prison labor for state profit, thus making the legal system an economic and political exploitation of black people

What was Black Codes?

laws that were very discriminatory and making up new crimes such as vagrancy and loitering in order to mass arrest and incarcerate black people

Why did Stevenson argue that “nowhere was the animus toward black people more evident than in the criminal justice system?

Because without the ability to enslave black people and the more they prospered under such harsh conditions, white people were agitated and thus used the legal system as a means to create fear both of and among black people as they had the power to accuse and execute judgement with little to no oversight

According to Stevenson, how many African Americans were lynched between the Civil War and World War II?

thousands

According to Stevenson, what impact did Lynching have on America?

they were an act of terrorism in the US and shaped the geographic, social, economic, and political dynamics of the US for African Americans

What are Terror Lynchings?

the act of hanging someone, often of a perceived crime done to a white person, in which it was often public humiliation fear and a gather for white people.

According to Stevenson, What is the Equal Justice Initiative? What are the results of its research findings in relation to criminal justice policy today?

a research group focused on the categorization and impact of lynchings; they found that terror lynchings were more common than previously thought often over perceived slights to white people and that their decrease only truly came with the increased use of capital punishment in the legal system

According to Stevenson, how many Terror Lynchings have been documented between the end of Reconstruction in 1877 and 1950 in just 12 southern states?

more than four thousand

What were the six kind of terror lynchings most common from Reconstruction until World War II?

1) fear of interrace sex 2)casual social transgressions 3) allegations of a violent crime 4) public spectacle 5) escalated to terroristic level on the African American community 6) the punishment of leaders in black communities standing up against mistreatment.

Who were the Scottsboro Boys?

nine black boys that were accused of raping two white women and were given trial with a biased jury and incompetent lawyers thus convicting most to death sentences

According to Stevenson, although northern states abolished lynchings by 1850, some states in the South authorized lynchings until?

1938

What happened in the 1976 case of Gregg vs Georgia?

reinstated the death penalty in America to prevent a vigilante mob violence over certain cases and convictions

What as the Supreme Courts position on racial bias in sentencing in the 1987 case of McClesky v. Kemp?

decided that statistical evidence of racial bias in death penalty is not enough to get a repeal and is not enough to prove that there is racial bias in sentencing

How does Stevenson define Jim Crow?

an established legal system of racial apartheid era for black southerners

According to Stevenson, has America ever systematically and publicly addressed the effects of racial violence, the criminalization of African-Americans, and the critical role these phenomena play in shaping the American criminal justice system?

no it has never addressed any of these facts

According to Stevenson, does the Civil Rights Act of 1964 address discrimination in the criminal justice system?

no it does not address the CLS discrimination

According to Stevenson, what distinguished the US from South Africa, Rwanda, and the Germany?

there is no acknowledgement of the history in America and instead place markers of pride for the Confederacy and do not atone for the mistreatment of African Americans both during and after slavery

How has the incarceration of black men changed since 1954?

even with the substantial economic and educational opprotunity increase and increase in criminal justice actor diversity there is also a troubling increase of black men incarcerated

According to Mauer, what set the stage for Mass Incarceration of Black Men?

the introduction of “race-neutral policies” and the inherit bias in American society of racial discrimination and maldistribution of policing and prosecuting

When did the prison population and black male incarceration begin its historic rise?

1973

Identify the causes of modern oppression according to Mauer.

centuries long brutal racism that comes from racism and Jim crow laws that lead to oppressive social and economic conditions of America

According to Mauer, Why are murder rates important in measuring crime? reported crime..

historically the best reported crime statistic

Which presidential candidate articulated the need for “Law and Order?” and why?

Goldwater, in order to gain political advantage by focusing on the rise in crime rates; followed by Nixon

How are the racial overtones from former President Nixon promising to save white America from black male criminals, similar to former President Trumps recent claims of illegal criminal immigrants and make American Great Again!

Its a call to save the white Americans in particular from a minority group that is being blamed for all of the crime and bad things that occur in the country when that is not the case, politicizing crime in order to gain fear against an enemy that is also a minority to bring power to one person and using it to become president twice

CRIME RATES AND THE IMPRISONMENT RATE OF BLACK MEN- Why are they important?

The rates of both tell us two very different things, first is that crime rates from arrest data will tell us where most of the manpower is going (into marginialized communities) and two that the likelihood of imprisonment and length of incarceration is not equal among races and thus there is racial disparities in sentencing.

WHAT IS A MAJOR LIMITATION OF THE UCR REPORTS ACCORDING TO MAUER ?

separately reported race/ethnicity data and thus they cannot be used to routinely examine date among black men

According to Mauer, what is the relevance of reporting information on race and gender reported separately?

there can be routine examination involving gender and race/ethnicity among the data (also Latinos are an ethnic group not race so they are often put under any category that they are perceived under)

What were the finding of Krivo and Petersons study looking at the extremely disadvantaged neighborhoods?

that the rates of violence were considerably higher in those areas regardless of race

What did Alfred Blumstein’s 1979 study of the prison population reveal?

that 80% of the racial disparities found can be attributed to the arresting patterns and that drug charges were less correlated with criminal involvement

According to Mauer, despite substantial changes in leadership and staffing of criminal justice agencies in recent decades ( more people of color and women heading major law enforcement and correctional agencies), no moment when there has been less trust and confidence in the CJS among African Americans than now... How does this matter today?

Through the increased media coverage of events such as police killings, yet there was no data base for these incidents in the government and that there is a continued practice of violence and intimidation used on minorities especially black men to uphold the racist ideology that is still prevalent in society and its institutions

What is the value of government institutions tracking the killings of civilians by police?

It shows that they are willing to notice a pattern and care enough about the people in their communities to document and report such behavior, but since it is not the opposite can be assumed to be true as the system simply does not exist and journalists have to put together their findings in order to inform the public on the matter

What were the findings of the research by Chiricos and colleagues on racial perceptions of crime and influence of public support for harsh penalties? Pg 50

that white people that attributed crime and violence to black people were more likely to support more punitive crime policies and that they agreed with the idea that “African Americans pose a greater threat to public order and safety than any other group”

What is the stated rationale for mass incarceration?

it is necessary to subject millions of Americans to lengthy periods of imprisonment to promote public safety

What is the overall effect of mass incarceration and is it an effective strategy for addressing crime.

1) the pool of offenders is largely low level crimes 2) life in prison means that the age out of crime no longer applies to a large portion of individuals 3) it destabilizes communities already disadvantaged; all around it does not seem like an effective strategy for crime control or prevention due to the low cost effectiveness and the fact that it destabilizes communities that can cause more criminogenic factors for more people

What were the findings of the National Research Council in 2014? Why according to Mauer does Mass incarceration not have a major effect on crime?

Found that incarceration at such as scale is not cost effective and the broad use of life imprisonment leads to no aging out of crime as well as the destabilization of communities entering them into a cycle of community and prison

Why according to Mauer does Mass incarceration not have a major effect on crime?

due to the stigma and criminogenic factors that mass incarceration causes such as lack of opportunities and discrimination; lining up with a bunch of theories that lead to a higher likelihood of criminal activity

Since 2009, has the total incarcerated population increased or declined modestly?

Which states have seen significant declines and why?

it declined modestly; but specific states like New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and California experienced a substantial decrease in prison population

Why? Reduced incarceration of drug offenders as a result of policy changes and practitioner decision making.

the reduction of drug offenders in prison benefitted mainly black men who were overrepresented in this group but this slight decline shows that not a single initiative can cause a decrease in prison population on its own and there needs to be many changes enacted together to cause correction.

Why is the US unique in regard to the death penalty?

it is the only industrialized country that maintains capital punishment that strains both moral and the pressure of severe punishment

How should we handle the societal problem of pursuing public safety and challenging inequality? Is the CJS the proper vehicle? Education? What?

There needs to be both a societal and legal change in order to address the systematic/ institutional issues of the policing and sentencing as well as address the stereotyping and social underpinnings that uphold the current institutions

who was Dr. Gunnar Myrdal?

an economics professor at the university of Stockholm, he studied the sentencing disparities of the US against black and white defendants in similar situations

What did Myrdal conclude about the treatment of black-on-black crime?

that the treatment of crime committed by black people to other black people is not regarded as serious of in need of indictment conviction or proper punishment than when compared to when white people are the victim of acts

According to Spohn, what did research conducted during the past four decades concludes about racial disparity in incarceration rates and the use of the death penalty?

that there is racial disparities throughout every step of the process in the CLS and that death sentencing is disproportionate depending on the race of both the offender and their victim.

According to Spohn, how have legislative reforms, Supreme Court decisions, and changing attitudes about race relations, impacted criminal justice officials treatment of defendants of different races?

they have too much discretion so the reforms should take discretion away and make there be more uniformed cases through the three strike laws or get tough on crime policies

What is Spohn’s position on most commentators’ current view of the flagrant racism described int An American Dilemma?

while the overt parts have been mostly eliminated, most would agree that the punishment inequalities still occur to this day; as there is a legal step towards equality there is an equal and opposite reaction towards inequality

What were the conclusions of the 2004 Sentencing Projects’ report entitled Schools and Prisons: Fifty Years after Brown v. Board of Education? What was the status of black Americans in prisons or jail in 2004 compared to the number incarcerated on the day the Brown decision was handed down in 1954?

the sentencing project report says that black and Hispanic men, especially young men, are more likely to be arrested, serve life sentences without parole and have a higher chance for the death penalty; there are nine times more black men incarcerated between 1954 and 2004

What is Spohn’s position on decarceration?

while it is the most obvious solution to decreasing the prison population, due to the political and social context of the country it is not favorable or feasible.

What other policy reforms or changes are recommended by Spohn to eliminate or reduce sentencing disparities?

eliminating the mandatory minimums, less LWOP sentences and repeal or modify the three strikes tough on crime policies currently in place

Does Spohn believe that her recommended policy changes will eliminate the overt and implicit racial discrimination that leads to disparate punishment? What can they do According to Spohn?

no, but they will reduce the bite of punitive convictions of non-serious crimes and allow for the rates of incarceration to look more like those of the western democracies

What is Spohn’s position on evidence of racial disparity in the application of the death penalty?

it is a startling statistic that while black people make up about 13% of the population they are making up about 40% of the death penalty rates and that they are more likely to be sent there for the murder of a white person

What were the finding of the 1983 National Research Council’s Panel on Sentencing Research?

“factors other than racial discrimination in the sentencing process accounts for most of the disproportionate representation of black males in the US prisons”

How many waves of research on race and sentencing does Spohn review? What were her general findings?

four waves of research; 1 and 2 were concluded with “equality before law is science fiction” however turned out to be crude ways of research with little controls and lack of sophisticated methodology concluding that racial discrimination was in some pockets in some areas for certain crimes and for certain CJ actors; the third wave said that they were premature in 1 and 2 and that there were both overt and subtle forms of bias against the minority defendants in some social context; fourth is looking at the data while including ethnicity and better research methods; found four commonalities 1)the combination of extralegal factors create a larger disparity 2) process related factors play a moderate role in disparities 3) the punishment severity depends on both race of victim and offender 4) the effects of race and ethnicity were conditioned by the nature of the crime

According to Spohn, what is the state of racial disparity in imprisonment as documented by the Bureau of Census?

it has worsened over time to the point that black and hispanic people make up 3/4 ths of the prison populations

According to Spohn, what is Tonry and Melewski’s position on decarceration?

decarceration is the only way to truly reduce the amount of minorities behind bars currently and there should be ways to reduce lengths of their sentences that could release hundreds of thousands of people from prison; this does not mean that the efforts to change the bias in police and sentencing should not be stopped in favor of this but should be occurring simultaneously

According to Spohn, what is the Racial Justice Act?

allow for convicted offenders to appeal their death sentences using statistical data showing a pattern of racial discrimination, and the proof does not need to lie in the fact that there was a mistake in their trial/ processing. This was taken down saying that the statistical evidence is not enough and that death penalty is still an acceptable form of punishment even if it is used discriminatorily

What are Spohn’s recommendations after reviewing the research on race and sentencing disparities?

1) eliminate tough on crime policies and lessen the amount of lengthy sentences and severe punishments 2) abolish the death penalty 3) enact the racial justice act and allow statistical evidence of racial disparity to show discrimination in sentencing