The issues of the criminal justice system concerning racism go a long way from offensive charges through pleas, criminal convictions, and incarcerations. The brutal behavior of law enforcement officials with people of color has been known for decades. In fact, in the last few months, protests spouted across the country in response to a flare-up of police for people of color. The Black Lives Matter movement is the most recent outbreak of the American republicans nationwide.
Such events or protests focus on seeking concerned authorities’ attention towards the need for criminal justice system reformation. The criminal justice system’s unjust treatment is a pervasive problem with racism. It results in pretextual stops leading to mass incarcerations.
The people of color incarcerated about five times higher than the rate of White people. African Americans suffer from disparate harsh imprisonment experiences.
Racial disparities are also evident with the students of color by higher incarceration rates, ultimately pushing them from the school-to-prison pipeline.
The biased treatment and injustice in the realm of the justice system are overwhelming. This problem of racial bias is deeply rooted in the system. Therefore, it is critical to mitigating the worse effects of racial discrimination.
Authorities play a crucial role in the administration of justice.
For instance, if the objective of law enforcement officials is to minimize illicit drug consumption, then focusing enforcement efforts on people of color is not a practical approach. However, inequities in police and court treatment of people of color prevail in the trend of racial injustice.
Disparities exist at each level of the criminal justice system. Besides, the over-representation of people of color at every stage of the system occurs due to inequalities in decisions. The people of color usually encounter denial of bails compared to Whites, due to which they suffer less access to community resources. The discrimination worsens by using tough-on-crime policies, making it difficult for the authorities to address the disparate treatment in the criminal justice system.
The United States is the world’s leading incarcerator, with about reported 700 per 100,000 incarcerations (Kovera, 2019). And when we take a glance at the racial impact of incarceration, we see that African Americans make up about 13 percent of the total population, whereas 40 percent of the prison population.
The attorneys need to keenly examine the disparities at every stage of the criminal justice system. They must root out the fundamental issues rather than search for the reasons causing inequalities because it is difficult to unearth all the adequate reasons behind the existing disparities. Significantly, the criminal justice system should achieve equity to reduce discrimination among the republicans. Also, investigations of criminal incidents should be free from prejudice to prevent civil rights violations. Moreover, the decision-makers should look at the complete picture before making any decision based on the end effect because doing so will result in a disproportionate number of people of color heading to get involved in the criminal justice system.
Reference
Kovera, M.B. (2019). Racial disparities in the Criminal Justice System: Prevalence, Causes, and a search for Solutions. Journal of Social Issues, 75(4), 1139–1164. DOI: 10.1111/josi.2019.75.issue-4/issuetoc