Racial Bias In The Criminal Justice System

Criminal justice system is the law enforcement that focuses on the safety of the public, which prosecutes, defends, sentences, and punishes people who are suspects of convicted criminal offenses. The criminal justice system is supposed to be equal to all races but it is not always like that even in this century. The criminal justice system is suppose to be color blind yet colored races are more likely to get hasher punishment than white people. There are studies that prove that there are more African Americans and other colored race people in prisons compared to the white race. Public discretion plays a role in the criminal justice system by racially profiling people because of their skin color. Furthermore, the court system still does
Michelle Alexander talked about how racial bias takes place at every stage of the court process. This process is the sentencing, prosecutions, jury selection, and police racial profiling colored races. (Alexander, 2012). Each of these parts has individual racism that they share and fall under the fourth amendment. Prosecutors have the most power in the court system. (Alexander, p.112, 2012). The type of people in the court system is protected to the claims of racial bias. The jury selection has a long history of race discrimination on juries in the court system. People of color would always get the harsher punishment and sentence. (Alexander, p.106,2012) Since the judges have the most power, many of them make illegal discretion towards the suspects because of their race. This also goes for prosecutors because many of the bring information into the court and base it on the persons race. Jury selection is based on race, which makes the punishments even harsher for certain colored individuals even though a big percentage of them are innocent. In Alexander’s book, she stated how “… And I don’t like the way they looked, with the way the hair is cut, both of them. And the mustaches and the beards look suspicious to me”(p.122, 2012). This shows how many judges are racist and can simply give a colored race a worse punishment just because of their skin color. Another statement that Alexander gave was the mandatory laws were taking discretion of the judge which resulted in racial discrimination when a person is was getting sentenced. This had sentenced many colored races in prisons, which lead to overcrowding court systems, and even prisons. (CJ, presentation). For instance, the judges see a colored person and automatically think that they are guilty of the crime that they are involved in. Some judges do not really listen to what the person has to