Incarceration Decisions Research Articles

Sentencing Native Americans in US Federal Courts: An Examination of Disparity

Existing sentencing literature largely focuses on the study of white, African-American, and to a lesser extent, Hispanic offenders. Unfortunately, very little is known about the sentencing of Native American offenders, especially in the federal courts. To address this shortcoming, the current study employs United States Sentencing Commission data for the fiscal years 2006-2008 to examine the comparative punishment of Native Americans. Consistent with the focal concerns perspective and its reliance on perceptions of race-based threat, findings demonstrate that Native Americans are often sentenced more harshly than white, African-American, and Hispanic offenders. Moreover, race-gender-age interactions indicate that during the incarceration decision, young Native American males receive the most punitive sentences, surpassing the punishment costs associated with being a young African-American or Hispanic male. These findings highlight the importance of directing increased attention toward the sentencing of this understudied offender population.

The Imprisonment Penalty for Young Black and Hispanic Males

In the United States, there are well-known racial, ethnic, age, and sex differences in incarceration rates. Younger offenders are more likely to be sentenced to prison than are older offenders. Black and Hispanic rates of incarceration are six to eight times that of White offenders and males are 14 times as likely as women to be sentenced to prison. This research explores how the combined effects of race, ethnicity, age, and sex, net of legally relevant factors, influence the decision to incarcerate. We examine these effects across nine offense categories. The analysis is based on Florida felony conviction data for the years 2000 to 2006. We find that legally relevant factors significantly influence the incarceration decision. Young Black males are most disadvantaged at the incarceration decision.

Sentencing Asian Offenders in State Courts

A significant body of literature has developed to explain the controversial issue of sentencing disparity among various racial/ethnic groups. According to the focal concerns perspective, judges may rely on race-based stereotypes, among other factors, in reaching sentencing outcomes. This contention has received support by the empirical literature when examining sentencing differences that emerge between similarly situated White, Black, and Hispanic offenders. Unfortunately, very little research has addressed the relative treatment of Asian offenders to determine whether stereotypes that commonly target these individuals—particularly the “model minority” stereotype—emerge as a potential extralegal factor in judicial sentencing decisions. To address this shortcoming, the current study employs a large sample of offenders processed by state courts to examine the sentencing of Asians relative to White, Black, and Hispanic offenders. Findings are consistent with a focal concerns/model minority perspective and indicate that Asians are, in fact, treated more leniently than other racial/ethnic groups at the incarceration decision. This extralegal disparity, however, does not emerge during the sentence length decision. Implications for theory, policy, and future research are discussed.

Exploring Sex Disparity in Sentencing Outcomes: A Focus on Narcotics Offenders in South Korea

Most research on sentencing outcomes reveals that legally relevant factors such as the seriousness of the offense and prior criminal record are primary determinants. There is, however, a substantial body of research that finds that extralegal factors such as a defendant's sex also influence these outcomes. Most of these latter studies conclude that female defendants receive less severe outcomes compared to their male counterparts. Most of this research, however, is limited to Western societies. To extend this body of research, the current study examines sex differences in sentencing practices for a sample of narcotics offenders in South Korea. Results support previous research; female drug offenders in South Korea are generally treated more leniently than their male counterparts. Tests for interaction effects reveal that the defendant's sex also interacts with other constellations of factors to produce lenient treatment for certain female defendants. These tests, however, also reveal that lenient sentence outcomes are not extended to all female defendants; those with prior drug convictions do not fare better than their male counterparts at the incarceration decision.

Decomposition of Racial Differences in Sentencing: Application of an Econometric Technique to Cocaine Possession Cases

This article applies an econometric decomposition technique to analysis of racial group differences in incarceration and sentencing of cocaine possession offenders. The standard 2-stage modeling approach is used to analyze the incarceration decision first and then, for offenders who are incarcerated, the length of the sentence. About a third of the difference in incarceration rates between Blacks and others can be attributed to the endowments, or characteristics, of the offenders’ cases. This means that it is not possible to reject the hypothesis that there is racial bias in incarceration decisions. In contrast, for those who are incarcerated, the differences in sentence length across racial groups are attributed entirely to endowments.

The Effects of Juvenile Transfer to Criminal Court on Incarceration Decisions

Juvenile waiver laws allow youthful defendants who have not reached the age of adulthood to be transferred out of the juvenile court and into adult criminal court where they are subject to prosecution as if they were an adult. Using data collected from 37 urban counties, this study expands on a recent study by Kurlychek and Johnson (2004) by comparing the pretrial detention and imprisonment outcomes of juveniles transferred to criminal court to those received by adult defendants 29 years of age or younger. This study also examines the potential effects of county context on incarceration rates of the county court communities. Findings revealed that transferred juveniles are disadvantaged at sentencing stage, and that incarceration decisions regarding young defendants are shaped by the context of the county in which they are processed.

The consequences of error: Recidivism prediction and civil-libertarian ratios

The utility of recidivistic prediction is limited by the false positive problem: predictions of failure (recidivism) that do not occur. False negatives (predicted successes but observed failures) are also worrisome, and together both types of error can be formally evaluated by what Blumstein, Farrington, and Moitra call the civil-libertarian ratio: the ratio of the subjective cost of a false positive to a false negative. Choice of a recidivistic criterion and selection of a proportion of offenders for criminal justice intervention have implications for the evaluation of the disutility or subjective cost associated with various civil-libertarian ratios. Logistic regression models of four recidivistic criteria are evaluated to demonstrate how base rate (observed failure rate) and selection ratio (proportion selected to fail) affect the disutility associated with a range of civil-libertarian ratios. Use of civil-libertarian ratios by criminal justice policy makers is demonstrated. Predictive utility is relatively difficult to achieve for rare recidivistic events if the decisions involve severe deprivation of liberty (incarceration decisions). Predictive utility is easier to achieve for more common forms of recidivism or in decision contexts where there is less concern for false positives, such as for “intermediate sanctions.”

Symbolic Policy and the Sentencing of Drug Offenders

This paper examines the sentencing behavior of judges in a context characterized by significant legislative and social change. Data from Georgia are used to explore the ways in which judges accommodated their sentencing practices to a general crusade against drug use and to specific legislation that identified trafficking as criminal, set harsh penalties, and limited judicial discretion. The results suggest that judges selectively mitigated the harshness embodied in legislative pronouncements. The extent of mitigation depended on when sentencing occurred, the offense under consideration, and the offender's race. The impact of legislative changes appeared to be shortlived for the initial incarceration decision and more sustained for outcomes involving imprisonment, but modest for both. The target of symbolic policies, the trafficker, bore the brunt of increased punitiveness, but some spillover severity affected less serious drug offenders. Finally, the effect of race on sentences was influenced by legislative changes. During the height of legislative activity, differential treatment by race increased, further disadvantaging blacks, particularly black traffickers.