The Role Race Plays in the Judicial Systems

The Role Race Plays in the Judicial System

Hannah Adams Edited by Alasdair Macleod

Hannah Adams is a first-year English major who has a long-standing passion for journalism. She is originally from Fullerton, CA. She is involved with two newspapers on campus, as well as a California law-based journalism internship. After undergrad, she hopes to pursue either a journalism-related career or a law-related career, or perhaps a mix of both.

ABSTRACT

The equal protection doctrine of the 14th amendment states that persons in similar circumstances must receive similar treatment under the law. Held by that standard, the courts of this country are supposed to reach verdicts that punish defendants equally and accordingly. But in recent events, it appears that the equal protection doctrine does not extend to every American. Racial disparity in sentencing is gaining traction as a grave danger that violates the rights of people of color in America. Statistically speaking, 1) “Young black and Latino males tend to be sentenced more severely than comparablysituated white males”; 2) “Whites receive a larger reduction in sentence time than blacks and Latinos for providing "substantial assistance" to the prosecution”; 3) “Black defendants who victimize whites tend to receive more severe sentences than both blacks who victimize other blacks (especially acquaintances), and whites who victimize whites”; 4) “...the race of the defendant also affects sentencing outcomes, with minority defendants more likely to receive a death sentence than white defendants.”¹ These are only a few of the racially-motivated issues that are responsible for the U.S. judicial system’s corruption.

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It is without a doubt that there are differences in the respective cases’ conditions just as there are differences per the judges that view them. But when there is such an apparent disparity that it is statistically proven that Latino and Black Americans face harsher persecution than their white counterparts, it is evident that systematic racism is an internalized problem within the US judicial system on all levels. It is the responsibility ofthis country to ensure that it is defined by a universal standard of equality, and yet for some, equality has become an unattainable privilege

INTRODUCTION

The Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause states that no state shall “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws”.1 Held by that standard, it is the legal obligation of the courts of the United States to reach verdicts that punish defendants equally and accordingly. But recently, it appears that the equal protection doctrine does not hold true for every American. Racialdisparity in sentencing is a flaw in the United States that violates the rights of people of color guaranteed to them by the Constitution. Statistically speaking, 1) “Young black and Latino males tend to be sentenced more severely than comparably-situatedwhite males”; 2) “Black defendants who victimize whites tend to receive more severe sentences than both blacks who victimize other blacks (especially acquaintances), and whites who victimize whites”; 3) “...the race of the defendant also affects sentencing outcomes, with minority defendants more likely to receive a death sentence than white defendants.”2 These are only a few of the racially-motivated issues within the U.S. judicial system. To ensure

1 U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 2 2 Tushar Kansal, RACIAL DISPARITY IN SENTENCING: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE (2005), https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/uploads/764bf15013d8-4330-b08b-b04ae313308f/disparity.pdf

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equal protection under the law for all individuals, the U.S. judicial systems from the Federal to the local level need to adapt to expel this racial bias.

I. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

The Civil War led to the adoption of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. It was intended to grant citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States—including formerly enslaved people and guaranteed all citizens “equal protection of the laws.”¹Initially, only black male U.S. citizens benefited from this clause —and only slightly, for that matter. But throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, several Supreme Court cases helped ensure the application of the 14th Amendment to expand and include other groups, as well as to strengthen its enforcement of equality. During the 1920s, the Supreme Court started a trend of increased application of the 14th Amendment on both state and Federal levels. During the 20th century, thetwo-classtheory, the belief that the 14th Amendment only applied to black U.S. citizens facing discrimination from white Americans, excluded other minority groups from the rights of the 14th Amendment. Until 1946, when the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Mendez v. Westminster School Dist., 64 F. Supp. 544 (S.D. Cal. 1946) ruled thatthe forceful segregation of Mexican Americanstudents via their ancestry, skin color and ability to speak Spanish violated the 14th Amendment. This case, along with many others, solidified a foundation of upholding the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment, essentially ensuring the landmark Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954). Arguably the most renowned victory in light of this Amendment, Brown v. Board of Educationruled that the previous “separate but equal” segregation standard established by Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896) violated the 14th Amendment by subjecting minorities to a lower standard of education, services, among other things. In spite of efforts made to enforce

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the 14th Amendment (and, by extension, the equal protection clause), racial disparity continues to plague the judicial system today.

II. HARSHER SENTENCES

In the U.S. judicial system, it is very clear that white Americans are favored when sentenced. Groups are more likely to receive harsher sentences than their white counterparts. ²One example of this racial bias could be the disparity in severity between People Of The State Of Colorado v. AguileraMederos (2019), and Texas Vs. Ethan Couch (2013). Both of these cases feature four counts of vehicular manslaughter, although the cases themselves vary. On April 26, 2019, Mederos was arrested and charged with multiple counts of vehicular homicide following a highway crash when his semi-truck he was driving as well as four other vehicles. Mederos was initially under investigation for vehicular manslaughter, but on May 3, 2019, the charges were revised to 40 different ones, including six counts of first-degreeassault and 24 counts of attempted first degree assault. Mederos claimed that his brakes failed to work; however, this claim could not be properly investigated due to the state of the semi after the crash. At the time, the company Mederos was working for, Castellano 03 Trucking LLC, bore a history of 30 safety violations within the two-yearperiod prior to the crash. The most relevant of the violations included employing truck drivers who could not understand highway signs due to language barriers. Interstate 70 in Colorado, the site of the crash, contains many English-only signs between Genesee and Colorado Mills Parkway that warn truckers of the perilsof the mountainous road, as well as the locations of runaway truck ramps. Mederos's trial began on September 28, 2021, in Jefferson County, and on October 25, 2021, a jury found Aguilera Mederos guilty of four counts of vehicular homicide. In accordance with the state's minimum statutory —in the words of sentencing judge Bruce Jones —Mederos was sentenced to 110 years in prison. In

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response to immense backlash, GovernorJared Polis granted Mederos clemency, reducing the sentence to a 10 year period instead. As for Couch, on the night of June 15, 2013, according to authorities and trial testimony, surveillance video showed Couch stealing two cases of beer from a Walmart store and then driving with seven passengers in his father's red 2012 Ford F-350 pickup truck at 70 miles per hour in a designated 40-mile-per-hour zone.On Burleson-Retta Road, approximately one hour after Couch’s Walmart incident, Couch’s vehicle collided with motorist Breanna Mitchell's sport utility vehicle, crashing into bystander Brian Jennings's car which in turn hit another oncoming vehicle. Couch's truck then flipped over and struck a tree. Prior to the crash, Hollie Boyles and her daughter Shelby, who lived nearby, had come out to help Mitchell, as her vehicle stalled. While Mitchell, Jennings, and both Boyles were killed, Couch and his seven other passengers survived. Following the incident, Couch, 16, was found to have had a blood alcohol content (BAC) of 0.24 percent, three times the legal limit for adult drivers (21 years old and older) in Texas. Couch also had traces of marijuana and diazepam in his system. Couch was subsequently charged with four counts of intoxication manslaughterand two counts of intoxication assault. Tarrant Countyprosecutors sought a maximum sentence of 20 years' imprisonment for Couch. Ultimately, it was revealed that Couch was sentenced to 10 years’ probation, and a hearing on April 11, 2014, confirmed that Couch began treatment at the North Texas State Hospital in Vernon, Texas. Without a doubt, discrepancies exist between the jurisdictions over these cases. While Couch was defended under the premise that he is too wealthy to understand morality, Mederos was punished for a mistake on his company’s behalf, a mistake that his company had been known to make in the past. These two cases are not an identical match, which goes to say that many circumstances of each case, including the age of the defendants as well as their respective states’ statutes, also play a part in the final verdicts. Wealth is another considerable factor in that it gave Coucha higher caliber of lawyers

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to choose from. Nevertheless, these cases are similar; Mederos’s initial verdict as opposed to Couch’s final verdict speaks volumes about the mistreatment of minorities in the U.S. judicial system.

III. HARSHER SENTENCES CONTINUED

It is also statistically proven that higher punishments are given to people of color for victimizing white people than vice versa. ²In the ongoing trial cases of Marc Wilson (2020) and Eric Barber (2021), although they have yet to reach a definitive end, it is clear that being African Americanis typically a greater disadvantage when it comes to evading higher punishment in the American legal system. According to an article written by Kami Chavez, 34% of white/Black shootings are ruled as legal while only 3% of Black/white shootings are ruled as such in states where 'stand-your-ground' laws and doctrines exist. ² Marc Wilson is an example of the unfavorable odds against black Americans in the U.S. judicial system. On the night of Jun. 13, 2020, Wilson and hisgirlfriend at the time, Emma Rigdon, felt threatened by a pick-up truck of young, white males while driving on Statesboro’s Veterans Memorial Parkway in Georgia. Fearing that he and Rigdon would be forced off the road, Wilson fired two shots: the first one as a warning, and the second one into the back window of the truck, where the bullet struck and killed 17-yearold Haley Hutcheson. Following the incident, Wilson turned himself in on Jun. 17, from which he spent 20 months in pretrial detention before being released on a $100,000 bail. The original judge of the case, Judge Muldrew, was recused; he was succeeded in the legal proceedings by Judge Ronnie Thompson due to his jurisdiction being tainted by a “racially charged atmosphere permeating the trial proceedings.”3 Currently, Wilson is awaiting

3 Nicole Henderson, Judge Michael Muldrew’s removal from the Marc Wilson Case, Just Georgia (2022), https://www.just-georgia.org/press-release-february-4

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trial to see whether or not he is immune to his charges by way of the “stand your ground” law that exists within Georgia. Conversely, Eric Barber received a much lighter sentence for a comparable crime. On the night of Nov. 3, 2021, Barber fatally shot his neighbor Justin King in Bourbon, Missouri after allegedly trying to diffuse an unrelated conflict. Initially, Barber and King had what other neighbors deemed a “cordial” exchange, but within an hour, King returnedto Barber’s residence enraged. Investigators concluded that there was an altercation that seemingly forced Barber’s hand, leading him to shoot King three times. After a coronary analysis, it was revealed that King tested positive for methamphetamine and THC metabolites —the main psychoactive compound in cannabis. In a Facebook update on Nov. 8, the Crawford County Sheriff’s Office confirmed Barber’s release from custody the following day. In accordance with Missouri’s castle doctrine, Barber legally had the grounds “to use force against intruders, without the duty to retreat, based on the notion that your home is your "castle."”4 However, King’s family as well as other neighbors within the community assert the belief that officials severely mishandled thecase —as a result, the FBI is currently investigating the case. Again, there are discrepancies between the two cases, with the main ones being the difference in the judges themselves as well as state differences. While one was at a private residence, the other arose from an argument. And while Wilson was released from pretrial detention after a 20-monthperiod, Barber was released within days of him being taken into custody. The authorities in Wilson’s case failed to automatically recognize and apply the “stand your ground law,” while the authorities in Barber’s case seemed eager to apply it in spite of the community’s views on Barber. The willingness of the authorities to assume Barber’s innocence versus Wilson’s innocence —

4 Mo. Rev. Stat. § 563.031(2016)

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although in different circumstances —illustrates one of the many examples of what racial disparity looks like in the U.S. courts.

IV. GREATER RISK OF DEATH PENALTY

It is statistically proven that people of color are more likely to recieve the death penalty than white people in similar circumstances. ²Filicide —the act of intentionally murdering one’s own child —defines the somewhat similar cases of Melissa Lucio and Lois Jurgens. But while Jurgens only served eight years, Lucio became the first woman in Texas history to be sentenced to death.

On February 17, 2007, Mariah Alvarez, the two-year-old daughter of Melissa Lucio, was found unresponsive and not breathing with evidence of abuse on her body. While Lucio attributed Alvarez’s injuries to a fall down a set of stairs, it was later determined that Mariah's arm had been broken prior to her death, and an autopsy revealed a head injury and bruising of the kidneys, lungs and spinal cord. Alvarez was pronounced dead upon arrival at a local hospital. Following her daughter’s death, Lucio admitted to disciplining Alvarez, but denied ever having seriously abused her. Ultimately, Lucio was found guilty of capital murder; she was sentenced to deathin 2008. In January 2022, Cameron Countyofficials signed an execution warrantfor Lucio. Her execution is scheduled for Apr. 27, 2022. On the morning of April 11, 1965, Dennis Jurgens died at the hands of Lois Jurgens, his adoptive mother. The official cause of death was peritonitisdue to perforation of the small bowel. Lois Jurgens had a history of abusing her children —especially Dennis Jurgens. Including prior records of starvation, scarring and bite-marks on his genitalia, there was also evidence of lacerations and layers of bruises. In spite of this evidence, Dennis Jurgen’s death was ruled as an accidental slaying. For years, Dennis Jergen’s murder went cold until his biological mother, Jerry Sherwood, sought justice for her deceased son. On May 3, 1988, Lois Jergens was sentenced to at least 15 years

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of state prison on one count of second-degreemurder and two counts of third-degreemurder. L. Jurgens only served eight years of her sentence and was released early on the premise of good behavior. Although these cases both feature filicide, they occur in different states as well as different time periods. This is significant in that during her time, Lois Jurgens would not only have had her whiteness toher advantage, but the society and law enforcement of the mid-1960s were indirectly sympathetic to Lois Jurgens, as the concept of a middle-class child being abused was (at the time) unheard of. Consequently, proving Lois Jurgens murdered her son would have been nearly impossible. There was blatant physical evidence pointing towards abuse, and yet the medical examiner initially categorized it asdeferred, i.e. the examiner thought that there was insufficient evidence to even classify the death as an accident, let alone a homicide.

V. DISCLAIMER

In the above-mentioned cases, there are moments of inconsonance —both negligible and significant —that led to the respectivecases’ results. Be it state law differences, such as different levels of punishments as well as different statutes, era differences —i.e. what society deemed as acceptable and what it understood –or age differences, the inconsistency of America’s courts makes it difficult, impossible, even, to find identical cases for a flawless comparison. Alongside these differences, judge bias undoubtedly plays a crucial role in the execution of a case. Following the Supreme Court's decision in United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220 (2005), the United States Sentencing Commission (USSC) reported that there has been an increase in racial disparity in sentencing.5 This in part due to the fact that the Booker case allowed federal

5 Demographic Differences in Sentencing, Demographic Differences In Sentencing (2017) https://www.ussc.gov/research/research-reports/demographic-differencessentencing

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judges to be more liberal with sentencing by facilitating the imposition of higher or lesser sentences than the USSC's sentencing guidelines called for. Prior to the Booker verdict, federal judgeswere expected to follow those sentencing guidelines. As a result, racial bias from judges, be it unconscious or explicit, has found a perversely legal way to obstruct the U.S. judicial system from granting all of its citizens equal justice. There is such an apparent disparity that it is statistically proven that minority groups face harsher persecution than their white counterparts, therefore it is evident that systematic racism is an inherent problem ingrained within the US judicial system’s sentencing processes. As enshrined by the Constitution, the preamble Declaration of Independence -'All men are created equal.', and yet for some, equality has become an unattainable privilege.

VI. SOLUTIONS

As daunting as it may seem to rebuild the foundations of the U.S. judicial system, it can be done. Marc Mauer, the executive director of the Sentencing Project, suggests that to improve the system, there must be a unified front between policy makers, law enforcers and community groups to eliminate any chance of underrepresentation and bias.6 One strategy that Mauer proposed is to consider the racial impact of criminal justice policies, both in practice and proposed, which would allow opportunity for discussion of racial disparities that would prevent any biased policies. This could be done by creating a task force of both community members and representatives for the criminal justice system. Mauer outlines the purpose of this task force; “(to) [review] and [analyze] data on prosecutorial practices and [develop] initiatives designed to promote the twin goals of maintaining public safety

6 Marc Maurer, Justice For All? Challenging Racial Disparities in the Criminal Justice System, American Bar Association (2010) https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/h uman_rights_vol37_2010/fall2010/justice_for_all_challenging_racial_disparities_crimi nal_justice_system/

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and reducing disparity.” ⁶ The different backgrounds would minimize the chances of underlying bias manifesting itself in the creation of new policies

CONCLUSION

The U.S. Department of Justice projects that if current trends of racial bias persist, one-fourth of all black males born today will go to prison in their lifetimes; one-sixth of every Latino males born today will follow.7 Although incarceration rates amongst women are statistically lower than for men, the projected future for minority women mirrors that of their male counterparts.⁷ To be a person of color in America’s judicial system is to be prosecuted in a system that favors white people, a direct consequence of sentencing practices aimed to benefit or punish certain demographics. Currently, a legal system that maintains equality under the law is merely a theoretical concept. America’s tradition of racial discrimination is as old as the country itself. But as opposed to keeping up with tradition, it is time to build an America that champions racial equality under the law.

7 Glen Kessler, The stale statistic that one in three black males ‘born today’ will end up in jail, Washington Post (2015) https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/factchecker/wp/2015/06/16/the-stale-statistic-that-one-in-three-black-males-has-a-chanceof-ending-up-in-jail/

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