The Effect of Pretrial Detention on Sentencing in Two Federal Districts

While a substantial body of research indicates that legal variables, such as offense severity and criminal history, principally shape sentencing decisions, other studies demonstrate that extralegal factors such as race, gender, and age influence sentencing outcomes, as well. The handful of studies focusing upon the effect of pretrial detention/release on sentencing outcomes indicate that pretrial detention is associated with greater lengths of incarceration. This study—the first to empirically examine the sentencing consequences of pretrial detention in the United States federal courts—employed a sample of 1,723 cases from two district courts (New Jersey and Pennsylvania Eastern). Pretrial detention and, to a lesser degree, revocation of granted pretrial supervision were associated with increased prison sentences; on the other hand, successfully completing a term of pretrial services supervision was associated with shorter sentence length. Implications for the federal criminal justice system are discussed.     

Symbol and Substance: Effects of California's Three Strikes Law on Felony Sentencing

California's “three strikes and you're out” law is the most notorious example of the wave of mandatory sentencing policies that many states enacted beginning in the late 1970s. While advocates and critics predicted the law would have profound effects on aggregate punishment trends and individual case outcomes, Feeley and Kamin's analysis of previous sentencing reforms suggested the law's impact would be mainly symbolic because local officials would ignore, subvert, or nullify its major provisions. While aggregate analyses have tended to confirm this argument, so far there has been no systematic test of the law's effect on individual cases. This analysis uses multilevel models applied to case‐level data from 12 urban California counties to test hypotheses about shifts in average punitiveness, the relative influence of legal and extralegal factors on sentencing, and the uncertainty of sentencing outcomes. Results mostly support Feeley and Kamin's symbolic interpretation, but also reveal important substantive impacts: since Three Strikes, sentences have become harsher, particularly in politically conservative counties, and black felons receive longer prison sentences.     

Institutionalizing inequality in the courts: Decomposing racial and ethnic disparities in detention,conviction, and sentencing*

A significant body of literature has examined racial and ethnic inequalities in sentencing, focusing on how individual court actors make decisions, but fewer scholars have examined whether disparities are institutionalized through legal case factors. After finding racial and ethnic inequalities in pretrial detention, conviction, and incarceration based on 4 years of felony court data (N = 83,924) from Miami-Dade County, we estimate nonlinear decomposition models to examine how much of the inequalities are explained by differences in criminal history, charging, and for conviction and incarceration, pretrial detention. Results suggest that inequality is greatest between White non-Latinos and Black Latinos, followed by White non-Latinos and Black non-Latinos, ranging from 4 to more than 8 percentage points difference in the probability of pretrial detention, 7–13 points difference in conviction, 5–6 points in prison, and 4–10 points difference in jail. We find few differences between White non-Latinos and White Latinos. Between half and three-quarters of the inequality in pretrial detention, conviction, and prison sentences between White non-Latino and Black people is explained through legal case factors. Our findings indicate that inequality is, in part, institutionalized through legal case factors, suggesting these factors are not “race neutral” but instead racialized and contribute to inequalities in court outcomes.     

Low-Level,but High Speed?: Assessing Pretrial Detention Effects on the Timing and Content of Misdemeanor versus Felony Guilty Pleas

Abstract

While numerous studies have examined pretrial detention and felony case outcomes, little empirical attention has been devoted to misdemeanor pretrial detention. We theorize that misdemeanants detained for a longer proportion of time will plead guilty quicker because the costs of fighting their charges in jail often outweigh the sanctions they face. Utilizing data on 165,630 felony and misdemeanor cases from Miami-Dade County, Florida, during a 4-year period (2012–2015) we assess whether the effects of pretrial detention length on the timing and content of guilty pleas differ across lower-level and upper-level courts. Survival analyses and multinomial logistic regressions indicate that misdemeanor cases overall and those involving lengthier pretrial detention are resolved faster, with most resulting in non-carceral sanctions such as credit for time served (CTS). Given that misdemeanors make-up the bulk of U.S. criminal cases, these findings reveal important insights about how pretrial detention impacts case-processing dynamics in lower courts.     

Exploring sentencing in three European cities

This research represents the results of a sentencing study conducted in three cities in Europe. The cities were chosen because they represent widely varying judicial philosophies. The question addressed is: do different formal legal attitudes impact sentencing behaviors? Data come from a randomly selected set of cases acquired from one judge in each of the three cities. The results indicate that, as in the United States, extra‐legal variable play a lesser role than legally relevant criteria in determining sentences. Contextual factors are also important as the models for explaining the variations in sentencing decisions change from city to city. This research continues the line of investigation which points to the need for a more thorough sample of sentencing decisions so that generalizations about the relationship between ideology and courtroom behavior can be made across countries.     

Contextualizing sentencing disparities: using conjunctive analysis of case configurations to identify patterns of variability

Using national data from felony cases processed in state courts (n = 48,006), the current study investigates the nature and magnitude of contextual variability associated with sentencing outcomes. Multivariate models are first estimated to identify the main effects of various offender and offense variables on sentencing decisions. Conjunctive analysis is then used to evaluate the contextual variability of each of these main effects across all observed combinations of offender and offense attributes. Separate analyses are also conducted among states with and without mandatory sentencing guidelines to explore whether these guidelines reduce this variability across different contexts. Findings from this study and its comparative methods are discussed in terms of implications for future research on criminal sentencing and assessing the contextual variability of the main effects of particular legal and extralegal factors.     

The effect of local policy on the sentencing patterns of state wards

A large number of studies have identified individual and offense characteristics that predict the severity of criminal justice system sanctions against juvenile delinquents. However, very few studies have examined the effect of local decision making procedures and funding practices on sentencing outcomes. As such local practices could have important effects on sentencing, the present study compared the sentencing of juvenile state wards in counties that differ markedly in local policies. The hypothesis was that the availability of state, as opposed to local, funding for institutional placement (called a “charge-back” policy) in one of the counties would result in a more severe sentencing decisions and that this county's use of board of decision makers instead of individual caseworkers would result in harsher treatment of youths differentiated by minority status, sex, or family status. This difference might be due to the board's insulation from review.     

Hukou Status and Sentencing in the Wake of Internal Migration: The Penalty Effect of Being Rural‐to‐Urban Migrants in China

While the disparate legal treatment of immigrants in Western jurisdictions has been well documented in sociolegal scholarship, the potential legal inequality experienced by rural‐to‐urban migrants in China, who have become China's largest disadvantaged social group, has not garnered much attention. To fill the gap, this article empirically examines sentencing disparities related to the Hukou status of criminal offenders by employing quantitative data on criminal case processing in China. The results of our analysis reveal that rural‐to‐urban migrant defendants are more likely to be sentenced to prison than their urban counterparts. In addition, the penalty effect of being a rural‐to‐urban migrant is further magnified in jurisdictions with a larger concentration of migrants. Our findings suggest that discrimination against rural‐to‐urban migrants has become an emerging, significant form of legal inequality in China's criminal justice system, refracting and reinforcing the deep‐seated structural inequality associated with Hukou status in China. The research and policy implications of these findings are discussed.     

Is the Process the Only Punishment?: Racial–Ethnic Disparities in Lower-Level Courts

Although misdemeanors make up the bulk of criminal cases in the United States, the majority of research on court decision-making examines felony sentencing. In contrast to felony courts, lower-level courts are characterized by higher case volumes and increased reliance on informal sanctions, which may contribute to greater racial–ethnic disparities. To assess this possibility, we examine pretrial detention and case processing outcomes for misdemeanants in Miami-Dade County, Florida. Utilizing temporal (detention time) and monetary (bond amount) measures of pretrial detention, we assess whether and to what extent there are racial–ethnic disparities in formal and informal sanctions facing misdemeanants. Results indicate that black defendants, especially black Latinx defendants, face greater informal sanctions (longer detention and higher bond amounts), are more likely to be convicted, and experience more severe formal sanctions than do white non-Latinx defendants. These findings complicate Feeley's (1979) argument about lower-level cases, revealing that black defendants are punished by both the court process and formal sanctions. In this way, “the process is the punishment” for lower-level white and nonwhite defendants, while the punishment is also the punishment for black defendants.     

Sentencing policy and disparity: Guidelines and the influence of legal and democratic subcultures

This study analyzed the effects of sentencing policy on sentencing outcomes and the determinants of sentencing decisions. The authors used hierarchical modeling to examine the impact of sentencing reform on legal and individual- and county-level extralegal factors in addition to the sentencing outcomes themselves. The research was framed within the legal and democratic subculture perspective developed by Richardson and Vines (1970) for understanding lower court decision making. The results indicated that sentencing policy acts as a filter, through which cues from each subculture are synthesized, and helps to shape the effects of both legal and extralegal variables on sentencing outcomes.     

Delinquency and Justice

Abstract

In an attempt to demonstrate the value of case study research on delinquency in American Indian communities, Tribal Court juvenile records from one western American Indian community, 1991 through 1998, were analyzed and interviews conducted with community members. Most arrests of juveniles were for alcohol possession and consumption, conduct offenses and status offenses. The most severe offense was simple assault. Youths were more likely to be detained for underage consumption than youths off reservation. Few bookings (26%) resulted in court hearings and all cases resulted in dismissal, deferred adjudication, or deferred sentencing. Girls had higher rates of arrest and detention than males. Interviews identified alcohol consumption and erosion of the extended family as correlates of delinquency.     

Location,location, location: Interdistrict and intercircuit variation in sentencing outcomes for federal drug-trafficking offenses

Research on sentencing has made clear that factors beyond case and offenders' attributes influence court decisions. Environmental and procedural characteristics also significantly affect the sentences of criminal courts. Yet, while state-level studies regularly control for such factors, most research on modern federal determinate sentencing has neglected jurisdictional attributes and variation as sources of extralegal sentence disparity. Using the organizational context and social worlds theoretical perspectives with a multilevel analytical approach, this study assessed how district and circuit of adjudication affect case-level lengths of sentences for federal drug-trafficking offenses, finding that both significantly affect sentencing outcomes and their predictors.     

Predicting Pre-Adjudicatory Detention Decisions

Abstract

Findings from studies examining the impact of legal and extralegal characteristics in determining pre-adjudicatory detention within the juvenile justice system have been inconsistent. Logistic regression was used to examine the independent, and interaction, effects of certain legal and extralegal factors in the decision to detain juveniles in counties in two Northeastern states. The results suggest race continues to exert a significant effect on detention decisions when controlling for various legal and extralegal/nonlegal factors.     

Predictors of Death Sentencing for Minority,Equal, and Majority Female Juries in Capital Murder Trials

The relatively small body of prior research investigating whether the sex composition of juries impacts sentencing decisions has produced equivocal results. Exploring this topic further, the current study used a large sample of capital cases from North Carolina (n = 675) to examine (a) whether jury sex composition predicted jury capital punishment sentencing decisions; and (b) whether there were different models of sentencing for male-majority, equal male-female, and female-majority juries. When we controlled for a number of legal and extralegal factors, our findings indicated that jury sex composition was independently related to sentencing outcomes. Specifically, equal male-female juries were significantly more likely and female-majority juries were significantly less likely to choose the death penalty versus a sentence of life in prison. In addition, different models (predictors) of sentencing were revealed for each of the jury sex compositions. Implications for future research and policy are discussed.     

A sociolegal analysis of Canadian youth justice: The impact of offender's race on judicial decisions

There is evidence to suggest that even within ostensibly egalitarian systems of justice young offenders are, at least in part, socially selected. Police, court workers, lawyers, and judges make prejudgments of young offenders on the basis of extralegal as well as legal factors. This study examined the influence of extralegal variables, especially offender's race, on judicial outcomes including detention on arrest, plea, adjudication, and sentencing. While the principal focus was the effect of offender's race, the effects of other attributes including sex, age, family support, and counsel status were incorporated into the analysis to present a comprehensive explanatory model of justice.Loglinear/logit modelling techniques were employed to assess the simultaneous effects of social and legal variables. In summary, the data consistently supported the claim that at all levels of the justice process extralegal variables, most noticeably race, had a substantial systematic influence on judicial decisions, especially when seriousness of offense and criminal record were controlled. Most importantly, the study showed that the effects of race occured primarily in interaction with both legal and extralegal factors.     

Reassessing the Influence of Criminal History in Federal Criminal Courts

Abstract

Prior sentencing research indicates that defendants with more extensive criminal histories receive more punitive dispositions and that criminal history influences sentencing decisions over and above its influence on the guideline recommended sentence. To date, these additional effects of criminal history have almost exclusively been treated as linear effects. However, there are plausible reasons to expect that criminal history could have curvilinear effects on sentencing outcomes that taper off at higher scores. The purpose of this paper is to explore the potential curvilinear effects of defendant criminal history on incarceration, sentence length, and downward departure decisions in federal criminal courts. The findings suggest that criminal history has curvilinear effects on each of these sentencing outcomes. As criminal history category increases, defendants receive more severe sentences, net of other factors, but only up to a certain threshold level, at which point criminal history effects taper off and even reverse.     

(Un)anticipated Effects of Sentencing Reform on the Disparate Treatment of Defendants

Despite concerns over racial disparities in imprisonment across the United States, little empirical attention has been paid to how changing the structure of sentencing might affect levels of disparity. This article examines whether Ohio's shift to determinate sentencing corresponded with significant changes in legal and extralegal effects on case outcomes, both generally and differentially for African American and white defendants. Bilevel analyses of felony defendants from 24 jurisdictions reveal relatively few substantive changes in these effects over time. Some changes involved reductions in race-related disparities (e.g., in the severity of charges convicted on), with others reflecting increased disparity (e.g., higher imprisonment likelihoods for African Americans). Findings underscore a modest link between restructured sentencing and actual case outcomes overall , with some relatively mixed effects on levels of disparity.     

Short‐ versus long‐term effects of Ohio's switch to more structured sentencing on extralegal disparities in prison sentences in an urban court*

Research Summary The impact of Ohio's presumptive guidelines on sentencing disparities was examined for one of the state's largest jurisdictions to determine whether the switch to more structured sentencing in 1996 had any enduring effects. Sentencing patterns were examined both before and shortly after the 1996 reform, as well as 9 years later. Findings revealed weaker race and marital status effects on imprisonment under guidelines versus stronger age effects, no changes in disparities based on a defendant's sex and means of support, and (virtually) no changes in the magnitude of legally relevant effects. Policy Implications Ohio's guidelines are more flexible relative to other guideline schemes, possibly accounting for the general stability in effects across regimes. Ohio has since transitioned to voluntary guidelines, which raised concerns that the change will yield higher levels of sentencing disparities. Findings suggest that the transition may coincide with no changes in legal effects, yet with greater disparities based on a defendant's race and marital status.     

The ‘Usual Suspects’

Abstract

A key issue in contemporary criminology is the role that social status, and particularly race, plays in legal processes. Previous research suggests that criminal justice proceedings-including arrest, conviction, and sentencing rates-are influenced by victim and offender race, but rarely examines the role of race in reporting events to the police. The following research uses data from the rape sub-sample of the National Crime Victimization Survey of households 1992-2001; logistic regression analyses are conducted to determine how victim and offender race influence reporting of rape to the police, controlling for other incident characteristics. The findings suggest that rapes with a Black perpetrator are much more likely to be reported to police, regardless of whether the victim is white or Black.