The early origins of judicial stringency in bail decisions: Evidence from early childhood exposure to Hindu-Muslim riots in India

Abstract

We estimate the causal effects of judges’ exposure to communal violence during early childhood on pretrial detention rates by exploiting novel administrative data on judgments and detailed resumes of judicial officers born during 1955–1991. Our key result is that judges exposed to communal violence between ages 0 and 6 years are 16% more prone to deny bail than the average judge, with the impact being stronger for the experience of riots between ages 3 and 6 years. The observed judicial stringency is driven by childhood exposure to riots with a higher duration of state-imposed lockdowns and low riot casualties.