Evidence-Informed Criminal Justice

The American criminal justice system is at a turning point. For decades, as the rate of incarceration exploded, observers of the American criminal justice system criticized the enormous discretion wielded by key actors, particularly police and prosecutors, and the lack of empirical evidence that has informed that discretion. Since the 1967 President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice report, The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society, there has been broad awareness that the criminal system lacks empirically informed approaches. That report unsuccessfully called for a national research strategy, with an independent national criminal justice research institute, along the lines of the National Institutes of Health. Following the report, police agencies continued to base their practices on conventional wisdom or “tried-and-true” methods. Prosecutors retained broad discretion, relying on their judgment as lawyers and elected officials. Lawmakers enacted new criminal statutes, largely reacting to the politics of crime and not empirical evidence concerning what measures make for effective crime control. Judges interpreted traditional constitutional criminal procedure rules in deference to the exercise of discretion by each of these actors. Very little data existed to test what worked for police or prosecutors, or to protect individual defendants’ rights. Today, criminal justice actors are embracing more data-driven approaches. This raises new opportunities and challenges. A deep concern is whether the same institutional arrangements that produced mass incarceration will use data collection to maintain the status quo. Important concerns remain with relying on data, selectively produced and used by officials and analyzed in nontransparent ways, without sufficient review by the larger research and policy community. Efforts to evaluate research in a systematic and interdisciplinary fashion in the field of medicine offer useful lessons for criminal justice. This Article explores the opportunities and concerns raised by a law, policy, and research agenda for an evidence-informed criminal justice system

Court Review: Volume 40, Issue 2 - Judicial Report on the Adjudication and Sanctioning of Hard-Core Drinking Drivers

Impaired driving is the most frequently committed crime in America. It has been an issue of debate and concern for the judiciary, as courtrooms across the country hear cases involving a majority of the 1.4 million annual DWI arrests. Since the early 1980s, concerned citizens have lobbied for and won considerable changes to the way these cases are approached from a public-policy perspective, often resulting in legislative initiatives and changes in criminal practice. Until now, however, little comprehensive research has been conducted on the implications of these system-wide changes for criminal justice professionals. In December 2002, the Traffic Injury Research Foundation—an independent road safety institute—released a report concerning the adjudication of DWI cases and the sanctioning of hard-core drinking drivers. Its findings were based on the views, insights, and opinions of more than 1,000 judges across the country. The report is part of a multiyear research initiative designed to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the criminal justice system by highlighting key problems in each segment of the system and recommending practical, costeffective solutions. Two earlier reports addressed problems in the detection and apprehension of hard-core drinking drivers, and the prosecution of these offenders. The foundation recently released the final report in July 2003, which addressed monitoring by probation and parole. In addition to funding provided by a charitable contribution from the Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc., the involvement and participation of several thousand criminal justice professionals across the United States—representing law enforcement officers, prosecutors, judges, and probation and parole officers—made this unique initiative possible. By identifying key problems and recommending practical solutions derived from prior research and validated by the experiences of thousands of professionals participating in the study, the initiative underscores the need for systemic improvements. As a starting point, this series of reports serves as a valuable sourcebook. It provides direction to criminal justice and traffic safety professionals at national and state levels. It also guides agencies in addressing concerns and in strategically reviewing existing policies. This research has received considerable support, cooperation, and interest from a wide variety of individuals as well as key national agencies. These groups include the Highway Safety Committee of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the National Traffic Law Center of the American Prosecutors’ Research Institute, the National District Attorneys Association, the National Association of Prosecutor Coordinators, the Conference of State Court Administrators, the American Judges Association, the National Judicial College, the National Center for State Courts, the American Probation and Parole Association, and the National Criminal Justice Association

The Anatomy of Discretion: An Analysis of Prosecutorial Decision Making

Prosecuting attorneys enjoy exceptionally broad discretion in making decisions that influence criminal case outcomes. They make pivotal decisions throughout the life of a case with little public or judicial scrutiny. With support from the National Institute of Justice, the Vera Institute of Justice undertook research to better understand how prosecutors make decisions. Vera researchers combined statistical analyses with qualitative analyses, examining initial case screening and charging decisions, plea offers, sentence recommendations, and post-filing dismissals for multiple offense types in two moderately large prosecutors' offices. In addition to a technical report, the study produced a summary report and four podcasts

Reducing Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Jails: Recommendations for Local Practice

People of color are overrepresented in our criminal justice system. One in three African American men born today will be incarcerated in his lifetime. In some cities, African Americans are ten times more likely to be arrested when stopped by police. With the national debate national focused on race, crime, and punishment, criminal justice experts are examining how to reduce racial disparities in our prisons and jails, which often serve as initial entry points for those who become entangled in the criminal justice system.This report, which relies on input from 25 criminal justice leaders, pinpoints the drivers of racial disparities in our jails, lays out common sense reforms to reduce this disparity, including increasing public defense representation for misdemeanor offenses, encouraging prosecutors to prioritize serious and violent offenses, limiting the use of pretrial detention, and requiring training to reduce racial bias for all those involved in running our justice system

Addressing the Emergence of Advocacy in the Chinese Criminal Justice System: A Collaboration Between a U.S. and a Chinese Law School

This Article addresses how the procedural, educational, and professional changes in China’s legal system have affected criminal trial procedure and criminal trial practice in the country. It discusses how these changes have created a need for Chinese criminal judges, prosecutors, and defense attorneys to be well versed in the adversarial process. It describes how the China Trial Advocacy Institute, a collaborative project between Renmin University of China School of Law and Indiana University School of Law-Indianapolis, has developed to help address this emerging need

Deputizing Company Counsel as Agents of the Federal Government

Policymakers must reexamine the manner in which corporations and other organizations that are suspected of wrongdoing are investigated. In the aftermath of the Enron scandal, laws like Sarbanes-Oxley, combined with recent changes to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, have substantially increased the penalties on companies and individuals for white-collar offenses. The combination of draconian sentences, lack of meaningful judicial control over the imposition of sanctions, and the impossible burdens on company officers have jeopardized the very nature of our adversary system of justice.To avoid the potential catastrophe of a federal indictment, business firms are taking extraordinary steps to placate federal prosecutors. And those prosecutors now regularly insist on the following: That business firms surrender or "waive" their attorney-client privilege, That firms must pressure their employees to waive their constitutional right against self-incrimination, That firms facing indictment refuse to advance legal fees to employees under investigation -- even if a firm concludes that an employee was just following directions or is otherwise innocent of any wrongdoing, and That embattled firms must discharge certain employees at the direction of the government -- even if a firm concludes that an employee was just following directions or is otherwise innocent of any wrongdoing. Any organization that balks at the government's demands risks months of negative publicity as prosecutors characterize a legal defense as "impeding" or "obstructing" the investigation. It is no overstatement to say that the enforcement of the criminal law, at least insofar as it applies to investigations of organizations, amounts to a state-sponsored shakedown scheme in which business firms are extorted to pay penalties that are grossly out of proportion to any actual misconduct

Report of The Sentencing Project to the United Nations Human Rights Committee Regarding Racial Disparities in the United States Criminal Justice System

This report chronicles the racial disparity that permeates every stage of the United States criminal justice system, from arrest to trial to sentencing. In particular, the report highlights the influence of implicit racial bias and recounts the findings of the burgeoning scholarship on the role of such bias in the criminal justice system. The report then details the ways in which the Supreme Court of the United States has curtailed potential remedies by discounting the importance of implicit bias and requiring that intentional discrimination be proven in constitutional challenges. Finally, the report offers recommendations on ways that federal, state, and local officials in the United States can work to eliminate racial disparity in the criminal justice system and uphold its obligations under the Covenant

Study Habits: Probing Modern Attempts to Assess Minority Offender Disproportionality

Oregon, Washington and Utah have recently taken empirical steps to assess the extent to which minorities are overrepresented in their respective criminal justice systems and to seek out the root causes of any overrepresentation observed. Davies contrasts and critiques the disparate analytical approaches utilized by these states and offers some thoughts about how people might improve the chances of success of future similar efforts