- Archives

New data released Wednesday by the Justice Policy Institute revealed that California's Three Strikes law disproportionately locks up African Americans and Latinos compared to whites. According to this first-of-its-kind analysis of the racial and ethnic makeup of Three Strikes defendants, African Americans are given life sentences under Three Strikes at nearly 13 times the rate of whites and the Latinos are incarcerated under Three Strikes a staggering 82 percent more than whites. According to "Racial Divide: An Examination of the Impact of California's Three Strikes Law on African Americans and Latinos," African Americans and Latinos are penalized at every stage of the criminal justice system at rates disproportionate to their share of the general population. "Three Strikes is systematically funneling African American and Latino defendants into prison for longer and longer sentences, mostly for non-violent crimes," said Vincent Schiraldi, executive director of Justice Policy Institute and co-author of the report. Schiraldi added that the racial disparities for African Americans were particularly harsh by criminological standards. "Rarely does one see any law imposed so disproportionately against one racial group," he added. [more

]