By Becca Cadoff, Preeti Chauha, Erica Bond,

• Misdemeanor Arrest Rates: The misdemeanor arrest rates in all Research Network jurisdictions decreased in recent years. These declines often followed a period of significant increases in misdemeanor enforcement. • Misdemeanor Arrests by Race: Black people were arrested at the highest rates of any racial/ ethnic group for all jurisdictions across the entire study period. Racial disparities between Black people and White people existed in all jurisdictions, and these disparities persisted despite the recent overall declines in arrest rates. However, the magnitude of the disparities varied by jurisdiction and over time -- ranging from approximately three to seven arrests of Black people for one arrest of a White person. • Misdemeanor Arrests by Age: Arrest rates were highest for younger age groups (i.e., 18-20-year-olds and 21-24-year-olds) at the beginning of the study period. At the same time, arrest rates were generally much lower for the oldest age group (i.e., 35-65-year-olds). Over time, arrest rates for the younger age groups fell the most, sometimes to rates lower than 25-34-year-olds. • Misdemeanor Arrests by Sex: Males were arrested at higher rates than females in all jurisdictions across the study period. Although the arrest rates for males fell more than for females, this gender gap in arrest rates persisted over the study period. • Misdemeanor Arrests by Charge: Within the context of fluctuating misdemeanor arrests, the composition of misdemeanor charges changed over time across most sites. Cross-jurisdiction trends indicate a move away from more discretionary, drug-related charges and an increase in the share of charges where there is an identifiable complainant or victim (“person-related” offenses)….

New York: Data Collaborative for Justice (DCJ) at John Jay College of Criminal Justice , 2020. 34p.

By The Working Group

The Minister for Justice Helen McEntee T.D has today published the final report and recommendations of the Working Group examining the Disregard of Convictions for Certain Qualifying Offences Related to Consensual Sexual Activity between Men. The report contains 95 recommendations regarding the introduction of a statutory scheme to enable the disregard of relevant criminal records.

“Nearly 30 years on from decriminalisation, Ireland has become a much more tolerant society. But there are many people who still feel the hurt and stigma created by the laws that criminalised consensual sexual activity between men.

By Allison P. Harris

How does racial diversity impact institutional outcomes and (in)equality? Discussions about diversity usually focus on how individuals’ identities shape their behavior, but diversity is a group-level characteristic. Scholars must, therefore, consider the relationship between group composition and the individual decisions that shape institutional outcomes. Using felony data from a large U.S. court system, I explore the relationship between racial diversity among the judges comprising a court and individual judges’ decisions. I find that as the percent of Black judges in a courthouse increases white judges are less likely to render incarceration sentences in cases with Black defendants. Increases in racial diversity decrease the Black–white gap in the probability of incarceration by up to 7 percentage points. However, I find no relationship between judge’s racial identities and disparities in their decisions. This study highlights the importance of conceptualizing diversity as a group characteristic and the relationship between institutional context and outcomes.

  American Political Science Review (2023) 1–16  

By Julian V. Roberts,  Elaine Freer and Jonathan Bild (Sentencing Academy)

This report provides an introduction to the concept of deferred sentencing. Courts in England and Wales have long had the power to defer sentencing for up to six months. The Government’s 2020 White Paper, A Smarter Approach to Sentencing, expressed an intention to encourage greater use of deferred sentencing. To date, very little research has explored this little-known element of sentencing law. The only peer-review publications exploring the subject appeared approximately 40 years ago. This report summarises the limited research on this topic and reports recent trends in the use of deferred sentencing in England and Wales. The power to defer sentence was conceived to respond to those individuals whose personal and professional circumstances are most likely to be in transition and evolving in ways that have consequences for the sentencing decision. For this reason, deferred sentencing may be particularly appropriate for young adults whose personal and professional lives are changing rapidly. The idea behind the deferred sentence is that the offender has a limited time (up to six months) to address the problems which gave rise to the offending for which he or she is being sentenced. When a court defers sentencing, the offender is required to comply with a number of requirements during the period of deferral. If the offender complies successfully with these requirements, there is a strong presumption that a non-custodial sanction will ultimately be imposed. This may mean imposing a suspended sentence order or community order in a case which would normally have resulted in a short immediate prison sentence. The deferred sentence therefore should serve as a powerful incentive for the offender to take steps towards desistance and away from offending. The deferral order commonly involves completing or undertaking a drug or alcohol treatment programme. The deferred sentencing provision was introduced in 1973 to provide an opportunity for the offender to demonstrate a change in personal circumstances during the period of deferral. Compliance with requirements designed to promote desistance normally resulted in the imposition of an alternative to immediate imprisonment. Deferred sentencing thus targeted offenders convicted of an offence serious enough to justify the imposition of a custodial sentence. The limited statistics available from the early period showed that almost all cases deferred ultimately attracted a non-custodial sentence. The volume of deferred sentences has declined considerably from a high of almost 10,000 cases a year in the mid-1970s although it is unclear why courts have moved away from exercising the power to defer sentence. Most deferrals (approximately half of all cases) over the more recent period covered by the statistics we have been provided with by the Ministry of Justice in response to requests under the Freedom of Information Act (2005-2020) involved theft or minor fraud. Crimes involving violence or sexual offences accounted for 3% or less of all cases. No data are currently available on the requirements imposed as part of a deferred sentence, the outcome of the deferment, or the sentence ultimately imposed.  

London: Barrow Cadbury Trust, 2022. 39p.

By Todd Foglesong, Ron Levi, et. al.

This report analyzes recent data on homicide and robbery to understand whether there is a relationship between violent crime and “progressive prosecution.” We pooled data on recorded crime from 65 major cities, conducted a statistical regression of trends in violent crime as well as larceny in two dozen cities, and compared the incidence of homicide before and after the election of progressive prosecutors in Philadelphia, Chicago, and Los Angeles, cities where we are conducting on-going research on changes in criminal justice. We also compared trends in recorded crime across all counties in Florida and California since 2015. We find no evidence to support the claim that progressive prosecutors were responsible for the increase in homicide during the pandemic or before it. We recommend that further statistical analyses of data on violent crime be supplemented by qualitative research and direct evidence about the practices of prosecutors in cities that recorded divergent patterns in homicide.

Toronto: University of Toronto, Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, 2022. 48p.

By Lorinda Riley

his research report describes a collaboration between the University of Hawaii and Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate Tribal Court. The research team sought to understand when and how tribal judges use restorative approaches in their cases, and they specifically hoped to look at the role of substance use and crime severity in the decision-making process of when to use restorative approaches. The report provides a summary of the research, including conceptualization and re-conceptualization prompted by legal changes and the Covid-19 pandemic, a statement of problem and research question, justice system background, research methodology, and findings; it details the process of collaboration; and provides author reflections on challenges experienced, lessons learned, and successes; and the appendices include supporting documents. The author describes how the research team developed the survey that would be used in the research study, including questions about the role of a tribal court in describing the strength of identification with restorative principles. Survey responses indicated that respondents self-rated their knowledge of traditionally appropriate behavior as a 7.2 and knowledge of modern-day behavior as 7.6 out of 10; respondents overwhelmingly believed that the Tribal Court should focus on “getting to the truth” and “making the perpetrator a productive member of society,” but were equally split about whether the court should “punish the offender” or “make the victim whole.” The author suggests that the results indicate the community has endorsed a desire for a restorative-focused tribal justice system. The author also noted the cultural differences and experiences of individuals living on reservation compared to those in the general population.

University of Hawaiʻi Mānoa: 2023. 64p.

By Patrick McNeil, et al.

“Persevere: Our Ongoing Fight for an Equal Justice Judiciary” documents the work during the 117th Congress to build an equal justice judiciary by nominating and confirming diverse and highly qualified individuals — including people with civil rights and public defender experience — to serve on the federal bench. The civil rights community has long understood that for there to be equal justice in America, we need fair-minded judges and justices who are committed to protecting the rights of all people and who come from all of our communities. This report details many of the judicial nominees — including Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson — who were confirmed during the 117th Congress, explains why their confirmations matter, and calls on lawmakers to bolster our democracy by strengthening the judiciary so that it works for all of us.

Washington, DC: The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights , 2023. 56p.

By  Joshua Page, Victoria Piehowski, Joe Soss

  Among the institutions that link criminal justice and inequality in the United States, commercial bail remains one of the most important yet least understood. Each year, the bail industry extracts millions of dollars from lower-income Americans, disproportionately draining resources from poor communities of color. We draw on ethnographic research to explore how the bail system operates as a predatory social process, arguing that gender interacts with class and race to structure resource extraction in this field. Poor women of color are especially subject to bail predation because they are seen within the larger social organization of care as bearing primary responsibility for defendants. Gendered care work and emotional labor are thus central to the field’s logic of practice and to bail industry profits.

RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 5(1): 150–72  

Edited by  Anna Nylund • Kaijus Ervasti • Lin Adrian

• Provides access to twelve unique studies by researches from Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden that were previously not accessible in English

• Gives a research-based insight into different areas of mediation such as family mediation, criminal mediation and court-connected civil mediation

• Offers a sound foundation for implementation of mediation legislation and programs

Cham: Springer Nature, 2018. 268p.

By John William Wertheimer

Race and the Law in South Carolina carefully reconstructs the social history behind six legal disputes heard in the South Carolina courts between the 1840s and the 1940s. The book uses these case studies to probe the complex relationship between race and the law in the American South during a century that included slavery, Reconstruction, and Jim Crow. Throughout most of the period covered in the book, the South Carolina legal system obsessively drew racial lines, always to the detriment of nonwhite people. Occasionally, however, the legal system also provided a public forum—perhaps the region’s best—within which racism could openly be challenged. The book emphasizes how dramatically the degree of legal oppressiveness experienced by Black South Carolinians varied during the century under study, based largely on the degree of Black access to political and legal power. During the era of slavery, both enslaved and nominally “free” Black South Carolinians suffered extreme legal disenfranchisement. They had no political voice and precious little access to legal redress. They could not vote, serve in public office, sit on juries, or testify in court against whites. There were no Black lawyers. Black South Carolinians had essentially no claims-making ability, resulting, unsurprisingly, in a deeply oppressive, thoroughly racialized system. Most of these antebellum legal disenfranchisements were overturned during the post-Civil War era of Reconstruction. In the wake of abolition, Reconstruction-era reformers in South Carolina erased one racial distinction after another from state law. For a time, Black men voted and Black jurors sat in rough proportion to their share of the state’s population. ……

Amherst, MA: Amherst College Press, 2023.  346p.

By Eric R. Collins

  Two observations about the operation of the criminal legal system are so widely accepted that they seem undeniable: First, it is a system of pleas, not trials. Second, the system is too punitive and must be reformed. One could easily think, therefore, that the Federal Rules of Evidence, which apply intentionally and explicitly only to the adjudicatory phase of criminal procedure, have nothing to do with the solution. And legal scholarship focusing on decarceration largely reflects this assumption: while many have explored reforms that target front end system actors and processes that lead people into the system (e.g. police, prosecutors, broad criminal statutes), and back end reforms that that seek to lessen the toll of punitive policies (sentencing reform, alternatives to incarceration), markedly fewer have explored how what happens in the middle — adjudication — contributes to mass incarceration. While this oversight makes sense, it is not justified because it is also equally undeniable that plea bargaining happens in the shadow of trial. This Article examines how the shadow of trial — specifically, the shadow cast by evidentiary rulings about the accused person’s past — contributes to the perpetuation of an expansive carceral state. It identifies how evidence rules have been relaxed, tweaked, specialized, or unmoored from their foundational principles in ways that facilitate prosecution and conviction or essentially force plea deals – without regard for the truth, fairness, or justice of the outcome. In other words, it identifies ways that evidence law undermines the Rules’ primary purpose, which is to advance fair proceedings “to the end of ascertaining the truth and securing a just determination.”   

Fordham Urban Law Journal, 50(3): 2023. 

By Brittany Friedman and Mary Pattillo
  Monetary sanctions mandated in state statutes include fines, fees, restitution, and other legal costs imposed on persons convicted of crimes and other legal violations. Drawing on content analysis of current legislative statutes in Illinois pertaining to monetary sanctions, we ask three questions: What are defendants expected to pay for and why? What accommodations exist for defendants’ poverty? What are the consequences for nonpayment? We find that neoliberal logics of personal responsibility and carceral expansion suffuse these laws, establishing a basis for transferring public costs onto criminal defendants, offering little relief for poverty, and supporting severe additional penalties for unpaid debt. Statutory inequality legally authorizes further impoverishment of the poor, thereby increasing inequality. Major related organizing and advocacy work, however, has created an opening for significant changes toward greater fairness.  

  RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 5(1): 173–96.

By Duke Law School, Wilson Center for Science and Justice

Nationwide harm lasting and severe causes many, people of millions of tens for these pay to poor too are whom of bulk The. fees and fines mandatory perhaps, fees and fines these of lowest the from arise, surprisingly particularly—cases criminal level minor other and cases traffic Police. misdemeanors and infractions traffic of millions of tens conduct the, far by, are they; year every stops between interaction common most .public the and enforcement law debt legal criminal, more s’What ,people Black burdens disparately 1.poor the and, color of communities debt legal criminal, many For fines their because accumulates from unaffordable were fees and require not do states Most. start the before pay to ability s’person a determine to courts waivers cost-no have they do nor, fees and fines imposing judges required has law the, long too For. indigent the for ,cases criminal level-low in collectors debt as act to assessing first without fines collecting and imposing of suspension the in resulting ultimately, pay to ability to barriers experience who those for privileges driving to get cannot people, license s’driver a Without. payment needs basic their get or, families their of care take, work ,doctor a visiting, school to children their taking like, met .  

Durham, NC: Duke Law School, Wilson Center for Science and Justice, 2021. 18p.

By The U.S. Government Accountability Office 

  Online marketing and communication platforms can enable sex trafficking— the commercial sexual exploitation of adults through force, fraud or coercion, or children under the age of 18 (with or without force, fraud, or coercion)—by making it easier for traffickers to exploit victims and connect with buyers. Section 3 of FOSTA established criminal penalties for those who promote or facilitate prostitution and sex trafficking through their control of online platforms. It also allows for those injured by an aggravated violation involving the promotion of prostitution of five or more people or reckless disregard of sex trafficking to recover damages in a federal civil action. It also makes federal criminal restitution mandatory for aggravated offenses contributing to sex trafficking. FOSTA includes a provision for GAO to provide detailed information on restitution and civil damages. This report examines: (1) DOJ enforcement efforts against online platforms that promote prostitution and sex trafficking, from 2014 through 2020; and (2) the extent to which criminal restitution and civil damages have been sought and awarded for aggravated violations under section 3 of FOSTA. GAO reviewed federal criminal cases brought against those who controlled platforms in the online commercial sex market from 2014 through 2020; visited a selection of online platforms in this market; and conducted a legal search to identify criminal and civil cases brought pursuant to section 3 of FOSTA. GAO also interviewed DOJ officials and representatives from third parties. 

Washington, DC: U.S. Government Accountability Office, 2021. 56p.

Edited by Wojciech Jasin´ski and Karolina Kremens  

This book presents a comprehensive comparative analysis of the substantive and procedural aspects of compensation for wrongful convictions in European countries and the USA, as well as the standard derived from the case law of the European Court of Human Rights. The collection draws comparative conclusions as to the similarities and differences between selected jurisdictions and assesses the effectiveness of the national compensation schemes. This enables the designing of an optimum model of compensation, offering accessibility and effectiveness to the victims of miscarriages of justice and being acceptable to jurisdictions based on common law, and civil law traditions, as well as inquisitorial and adversarial types of criminal process. Moreover, the discussion of the minimum European standard as established in the case law of the European Court of Human Rights enables readers to identify how the Strasbourg Court can contribute to strengthening the compensation scheme. The book will be essential reading for students, academics and policymakers working in the areas of criminal law and procedure.

New York: London: Routledge, 2022. 261p.

By Alexander Brown.

A Philosophical Examination. Hate speech law can be found throughout the world. But it is also the subject of numerous principled arguments, both for and against. These principles invoke a host of morally relevant features (e.g., liberty, health, autonomy, security, non-subordination, the absence of oppression, human dignity, the discovery of truth, the acquisition of knowledge, self-realization, human excellence, civic dignity, cultural diversity and choice, recognition of cultural identity, intercultural dialogue, participation in democratic self-government, being subject only to legitimate rule) and practical considerations (e.g., efficacy, the least restrictive alternative, chilling effects). The book develops and then critically examines these various principled arguments. It also attempts to de-homogenize hate speech law into different clusters of laws/regulations/codes that constrain uses of hate speech, so as to facilitate a more nuanced examination of the principled arguments.

New York; London: Routledge, 2015. 379p.

By Michael J. Lynch and E. Britt Patterson.

Collection of original and authoritative articles covering role and definition of race in criminal justice research, bias crimes, race and policing, juvenile justice, and much more. CONTENTS: 1. Law, Justice, and "Americans": An Historical Overview/Bailey. 2./Garofalo. 3.Minorities and the Police/Smith,Graham and Adams. 4.Bias in Formalized Bail Procedures/Patterson and Lynch. 5. Ethnic, Racial, and Minority Disparity in Felony Court Processing/ Farnworth,Teske and Thurmond. 6. Race and the Death Penalty in the United States/ Bohm. 7.The Over-representation of Blacks in Florida'sJuvenile Justice System/Tollett and Close. 8. American Indians and Criminal Justice/ Zatz, Chiago, Lujan and Snyder-Joy. 9. An Examination of Ethnic Bias in a Correctional Setting:The case of the Mariel Cubans/Clark .10. Racial Codes in Prison Culture/Thomas. RECOMMENDED: Adopted widely throughout the United States for courses on Race and Crime or Criminal Justice. The comprehensive coverage, avoidance of ideological jargon, and use of scientifically controlled studies makes this text is excellent for class use. Use with companion volume, "Justice with Prejudice," which examines the criminal justice management and personnel side of Race and Criminal Justice, and uses a more qualitative and theoretical approach.

Harrow and Heston Publishers. 1985. 205p.

Edited by William Eves, John Hudson, Ingrid Ivarsen and Sarah B. White.

Essays in Comparative Legal History from the Twelfth to the Twentieth Centuries. “This volume is a selection of essays taken from the excellent range of papers presented at the British Legal History Conference hosted by the Institute for Legal and Constitutional Research at the University of St Andrews, 10–13 July 2019. The theme of the conference gives this book its title: ‘comparative legal history’. …. But the chosen topic was also connected to the fact that this was, we think, the first British Legal History Conference held at a university without a Law faculty.”

Cambridge University Press. (2021) 278 pages.

By Marjorie Mayo, Gerald Koessl, Matthew Scott and Imogen Slater.

This book explores the dilemmas being faced by professionals and volunteers who are aiming to provide access to justice for all and to promote social justice agendas in increasingly challenging contexts. Public service modernisation has been accompanied by increasing marketisation and massive public expenditure cuts, with escalating effects in terms of the growth of social inequalities. As the following chapters illustrate, Law Centres have provided a lens through which to examine the implications of these wider policies, as increasing marketisation has been impacting upon staff and volunteers working to promote social justice in disadvantaged communities.

Policy Press (2014) 174p.

By Joe Tomlinson.

Assessing the next revolution in administrative justice. This short book examines three very different ways in which the UK’s administrative justice system is changing due to the influence of technology: the increase in crowdfunded judicial reviews; the digitalisation of tribunals; and the adoption of ‘agile’ methodologies by civil servants tasked with building the administrative justice system…ensuring justice in the digital state is a task that requires us to both study closely the empirical consequences of technology and revisit, and maybe even abandon, existing frameworks for understanding how administrative justice operates.

Bristol University Press.. (2019) 114 pages.