African Americans In The Criminal Justice System Essay

The criminal justice system in America is, in multiple ways, racially biased against African Americans. Black Americans are treated with racial bias when it comes to justice regarding their sentences, their driving, and for their use of drugs. While there are always unbiased “good” cops, judges, and other officials, there still seems to be plenty of racial judgement in the system, despite how subtle it may be. First of all, black Americans are sentenced differently and more harshly compared to white Americans for the same crime. Many people have reasoned that this may be because black Americans that were given longer sentences received said sentence due to past crimes those they have committed. However, in the article What it’s like to be Black in the Criminal Justice System, it states that “black male federal defendants were given longer sentences than comparable whites”. This suggests that black men still obtain longer sentences than a white man who has a similar criminal background because, like the article says, those men were comparable. In addition, it states that black men’s sentences were, on average, “10 percent longer than those of their white peers”. Another way the criminal justice system is racially biased is that black Americans, when pulled over, are far more likely to have their cars searched. More than that, blacks are more likely …show more content…
People might at first glance assume that this is because, by chance, black Americans are just more likely to do drugs. However, if you look a little deeper, that is not necessarily correct. In the article, it says that blacks are twice as likely to be arrested for drug crimes, although white Americans use and sell drugs at a comparable “or even higher” rate. It is more reasonable to think whites have higher drug use and selling rates because they simply make up more of the population. Unfortunately racial bias overshadows the facts and