Introduction
A large part of the twentieth century has seen crime and punishment in the United States provide the symbolic representation of racial divide in the country. Some researchers opine that the racial discrimination is pervasive and extremely rooted in the justice system but others have disputed that claim maintaining that the intentional discrimination is non-existent. (Doerner, 2010)The justice system has over the recent decades faced criticism over discriminatory incidences and continues to grapple with the same problem. Racial and ethnic disparities continue to persist in the criminal and justice departments in the US because of the various stereotypes that the ethnic groups have.
Stereotypes
The discrimination experienced by the African Americans and other minorities in the US is deeply enrooted in the history of the country. The discrimination is more on the minorities and on the Black Americans they are usually overrepresented in the justice system. The African, American are mostly arrested for 37% of violent crimes that include murder, nonngligent rape, robbery, aggravated assault and forcible rape (Doerner, 2010).
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The African Americans are mainly associated with violent crimes, whites are associated with burglaries and property crimes and the Latino or Mexicans are associated with drug trafficking. It is assumed that the black people are violent because of the pain and brutality they faced during the slave trade (McNamara, 2008). It is a generational aspect. The Asians and South Americans were forced to illegal trades in the US as they immigrated to the US because of the harsh conditions in the country and the racial discrimination that would not allow them to secure jobs (McNamara, 2008). Native Americans are also known for alcohol crimes like drunk driving but also violent victimization.
Effect of Stereotypes on Judgement
The past thirty years have seen the most severe effects of the racial discrimination concentrate in staggering proportions on the African American males from the inner cities and the low-income communities. Research confirms that some communities, races and ethnicities are more involved in crime than others (McMurray, 2008). The stereotype plays a significant role in passing sentences or judgment because the jury sees a person on trial as one belonging to a certain community and that makes basis of how likely the individual committed the crime. Jurors are more likely to convict a black defendant charged with vehicular manslaughter than they would a white defendant charged with the same.
A research by Gordon and McNicholas on the effect of race of a defendant on the sentencing decisions of jurors found out that after manipulating the nature of a defendant in regards to a blue-collar job discovered that the black defendants got longer sentences for burglary than the white persons charged with the same (McMurray, 2008). The same experiment was carried out in regards to bank embezzlements and the white defendant received a harsher and longer sentence than the black defendant (Kluwe, 2015). The notion is that the white people are more intelligent and are likely to be guilty of crimes that require high intellectual capacities as compared to the blacks that engage in violent and rather less reasoned out crimes.
Apparently, judges are hardly affected or swayed by race and most make their judgments or sentences without considering the race of an individual. However, the jurors recommend longer and much harsher sentences for the black defendants as compared to the white defendants in cases of negligent homicide (Kluwe, 2015). On the other hand the same jurors gave white defendants punishments that were much worse than the blacks in regards to embezzlement.
Conclusion
The racial card plays a significant role in passing of judgment because the judicial and criminal system in the US greatly predetermines whether or not a person is guilty by virtue of their race, ethnicity or community. Significant steps have been made towards having clean and fair system but still the criminal and justice system in the country continues to grapple with this phenomenon. Race and ethnicity thus plays an important role in influencing sentencing of criminals when jurors are involved but hardly is the case with judges.
References
Doerner, J. K., & Demuth, S. (2010). The independent and joint effects of race/ethnicity, gender, and age on sentencing outcomes in US federal courts: Justice Quarterly, 27(1), 1-27.
Kluwe, K. (2015). The Influence of Racial and Crime Stereotypes on Jurors' Representations of Trial Evidence and Verdict Decisions.
McMurray, A. J., & Karim, A. (2008). A perspective on multiculturalism and policing. Cross cultural management: An international journal, 15(4), 321-334.
McNamara, R., & Burns, R. (2008). Multiculturalism in the criminal justice system: McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages.
