Abstract
This article presents results from an exploratory study seeking to examine the role of sentencing in the continuing overrepresentation of Indigenous women in Western Australia's prisons. Sentencing data from Western Australia's higher courts indicate that Indigenous women were less likely than non-Indigenous women to be sentenced to a term of imprisonment when appearing before the court for comparable offending behaviour and histories.
Highlights
Despite criticisms about its continuing relevance (e.g. Belknap, 2001; Curran, 1983), the chivalry hypothesis remains a key hypothesis in research on gender and criminal justice outcomes (e.g. Franklin and Fearn, 2008; Griffin and Woolredge, 2006; Hartley, Kwak, Park and Lee, 2011; Turner and Johnson, 2006)
The universality of chivalry was later challenged by arguments that preferential treatment was only afforded to certain ‘types’ of women: whether or not women were afforded leniency depended on their fulfillment of gender role expectations (Herzog and Oreg, 2008, 49)
This presents a problem for female defendants of racial/ethnic minority and Indigenous backgrounds, as they automatically fail to meet such expectations
Summary
Despite criticisms about its continuing relevance (e.g. Belknap, 2001; Curran, 1983), the chivalry hypothesis remains a key hypothesis in research on gender and criminal justice outcomes (e.g. Franklin and Fearn, 2008; Griffin and Woolredge, 2006; Hartley, Kwak, Park and Lee, 2011; Turner and Johnson, 2006). In this paper, we report the main findings of a larger study which investigates the impact of Indigenous status on higher court sentencing outcomes for female offenders in Western Australia, using a narrative analysis of judicial sentencing remarks. The Current Research Using the focal concerns perspective to guide our analyses, the current research extends past statistical research on gender and race-ethnicity-Indigeneity through a narrative exploration of Western Australian higher court sentencing transcripts.
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