The Unrighteousness of US Penal System

America has always faced unending discourse among scholars from different academic fields such as psychology, philosophy, criminology, law, theology about the righteousness of the US penal system.  The issue of righteousness is challenging because what one society or culture consider to be morally just can be seen as barbaric to others.  The same is true in the Criminal Justice System (CJS) whereby what a country agrees to be ethical like the issue of the death penalty in the US federal law is not allowed in other countries.  Also what one generation considers as righteous may change with time because things that were unethical in the past such as slavery and colonization are not in today’s society.  Today most people consider social justice as righteous as it calls for equality and fairness to all in regards to access to equal opportunities and treatment and without discriminating others based on their race, gender, ethnicity or any other distinctions associated with social categories.  At an individual level, being righteous implies to conforming to behaviors and things such as movies, songs, and actions among other activities that the society perceives to be morally right.  Therefore, considering today’s society perception of righteousness then the US penal system is unrighteous.  

Unrighteousness in US Penal System

A survey conducted by Gallup in 2016 revealed that majority of Americans lack confidence with the US CJS as only 23% of them have great trust.  The study echoes a similar one conducted by Harvard Institute of Politics a year earlier which indicated that 49% of millennials do not have faith in justice system while some 40% had some little trust.  American citizens attributed inequality based on race and ethnicity as the reason for lack of confidence in the US penal system as revealed by both polls.  Such opinion is an indication of unrighteousness in the CJS.  

There are a plethora of studies which indicate the presence of bias in court rulings based on the convicts’ appearance, race, and religion among other factors despite their being no scientific backing to such prejudice.  In his book “Unfair: The New Science of Criminal Injustice” Benforado (2015) explains the various ways judges and the judicial system as whole apply illogical and unethical thinking while giving out their judgments.  He warns that the broken system risk incarcerating innocent people while letting free real perpetrators because of wrong stereotypes that do not have scientific backing on human behaviors.  

One major factor that has mainly been abused by the US Justice Department is the issue of race.  An individual race can play a significant role in their arrest and eventual prosecution even if they are innocent especially if they come for minority races.  The stereotype that African Americans are dangerous, violent and more apt to commit criminal offense has led to some of them experiencing unfair judgment because of their skin color.  Various studies have shown that blacks are more likely to receive harsher punishment than whites even when the crime committed is the same.  Research conducted by Eberhardt her colleagues at Cornell in 2006 revealed that blacks are more likely to receive capital sentence when they murder white victims than the other way round.  In their research, they observed that juries did not apply the stereotypes of black being more likely to commit crimes in case both the victim and defendant were African Americans but rather as an issue of interpersonal conflicts.  Such revelations mean that the US CJS is unrighteous as it does not treat equally victims and defendants as it favors one race over the other.  

Another saddening revelation by Eberhardt and her team of researchers (2006) indicated that not only did race matter but also the extent of skin darkness between to individuals as they illustrated below.

Figure 1: Variation in stereotypicality of Black faces (Eberhardt et al., 2006, p. 384). 

 From the above pictures, the person on the right is more likely to face a harsher sentence when compared to that on the left even if the crime committed is the same based on Eberhardt et al. investigations.  Other studies have drawn the same conclusions that skin tone could affect the type of sentence received (King & Johnson, 2016).  In their study, King and Johnson observed that dark-skinned blacks are twice as likely to be incarcerated when compared to light-skinned African Americans defendants.  Despite lack of scientific theory correlating skin tone to criminal tendencies, it still used as a basis for making wrong assumptions that result in unfair sentences.  The issue of harsh penalties does not affect black alone but also other minority groups.  According to a research conducted by Warren,  Chiricos and Bales (2012) revealed blacks are 24% and Hispanics 23%  more likely than whites to receive prison sentences because they are disadvantaged as minorities.   

A report by Gross, Possley, and Stephens (2017) paints a disturbing picture as it reveals that majority of blacks are the among the majority of groups that receive wrong convictions as shown by records of exoneration in the US.  The researchers attributed the false prosecution to racial profiling and bias without any scientific backing.  A review of their study reveals that more than half of African American convicted of murder are more apt to be innocent.  Also, Gross and his colleagues indicated that innocent blacks are more than 12 times to be convicted of drug-related crimes than white Americans.  In their study, they pointed out the fact that African Americans comprised the largest number of individual exonerated at 47% after the discovery that they were innocent.  They attributed the high number of innocent blacks facing prions sentence to racial biases in the CJS.  According to their analysis, the police target more blacks than whites in most criminal case such as drug-related crimes because they believe they are likely to engage in the vice while statistics reveal that both groups participate equally.  

Another issue that reveals unrighteousness in the US criminal system because of use of methods that are psychologically flawed is in sexual assault cases.  Gross et al. (2017) report together with Benforado (2015) book identifies eyewitness misidentification as leading factor that results in innocent people incarceration.  Benforado questions the police approach of showing victims images of potential suspects before the identification process as he notes that it has the potential of a victim picking a wrong suspect based on the pictures they saw rather than actual perpetrators.  Therefore, he challenged law enforcement agencies to use better alternative to the identification of sexual assault suspects such as DNA rather than relying on eyewitness which pore to misidentification errors.  

Apart from the issue of race, suspects can be wrongly convicted or set free based on their physical appearance.  Benforado (2015) observed that attractiveness and body size could influence the type of sentence that one receives.  One study conducted by Gunnell and his co-author Ceci (2010) had glaring revelations on how looks can affect judgment that one gets.  In their article, the author argues that some jurors make rulings based on the characteristic of the defendant.  Gunnell and Ceci observed of attraction leniency bias that results in jurors making judgments based on emotions rather than logic whereby unattractive defendants received harsher penalties than those considered as attractive.  The researchers explained the situation using Cognitive Experiential Self Theory which is triggered by previous experiences of what is regarded to be good together with stereotype thinking.  In their study, the Gunnell and Ceci concluded that 22% of unattractive people are more likely to be convicted based on their looks rather than using rational means to make verdicts.  The result of the study means that a significant number of Americans could be having unfair trails because of their physical looks which is an indication that the US CJS is unjust.  

To perform its roles of retribution, incapacitation, deterrence, and rehabilitation effectively, the US prison system should remove the cruel ways of inflicting punishment on convicts.  The prison should banish solitary confinement as studies show such treatment can result in adverse physiological effects that affect one interaction with the public once released from jail.  Solitary confinement is related to mental illness and can increase the rate of recidivism (Arrigo & Bullock, 2008).   Such a situation is a blow to the prison system in achieving its rehabilitation objectives.  Other harsh punishments that lack any scientific backing on whether on their effectiveness to deter crime such as death penalty, hard labor and separating convicts from the real world need to be reevaluated (Gleissner, 2011).  

Although some argue that today the CJS has transformed considerably to be fairer and treat every on equally than in the past, evident reviewed earlier such as that written by Gross et al. (2017) revealed that a lot needs to be done given that still the percentage of minority groups unfairly targeted is unacceptable.  Also today forensic technology is very advanced that it has become easier for identification of suspect though modern ways such as the use of DNA.  However various studies have indicated there are weaknesses in forensic methods used which are challenging to the jury, have questionable reliability and having flaws in the admissibility of expert evidence (O’Brien, Daeid & Black, 2015).  The review of the above evidence against the US penal system together with the refutation against its perceived pros this paper concludes that the US CJS is unrighteous.  

Conclusion

            The US penal system is unrighteous thanks to inequality as a result of discrimination based on race, ethnicity and other factors.  As observed earlier the US criminal system is flawed as minority groups such as African Americans and Hispanics are unfairly treated using stereotype thinking.   Some of the factors wrongly used in determining the innocence or guiltiness of a defendant are their race and skin tone that are related to the possibility of committing a crime.  Again it was noted that the punishment inflicted to convicts do not have scientific evidence to support their effectiveness as some methods such as solitary confinement have been shown to have negative consequences such as mental problems and affect the ability of convicts to re-enter the world which affects the prison ability to rehabilitate prisoners effectively.  Although some may argue that the US CJS is perfect, some studies show otherwise.   Studies such as that of Gross and his collages reveal that the system needs improvement in fair treatment to be considered great also other studies have questioned the effectiveness of forensic methods used by the law enforcers which needs reviewing.  

References

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